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Defeat was not the end of the dream… but rather the beginning of the question
Despite the bitterness of being knocked out by Argentina in the round of 16 at the 2026 FIFA World Cup, Egypt left the tournament with their heads held high after one of their best international performances in years, managing to get past the group stage and establish themselves as a tough challenger against one of the title’s most prominent contenders. But beyond the result of the match, the tournament posed a bigger question to Egyptian football. How can this development be sustained and turned into a sustainable project that creates generations that can compete with world leaders?
The answer may not lie in South America or Western Europe, but rather in the north of the European continent, where Norway have managed to write one of the most inspiring stories in modern football.
The country, which has a population of less than five and a half million people and has been absent from the World Cup since the French edition in 1998, has turned into one of the tournament’s most popular teams in a few years after knocking off Brazil and reaching the quarter-finals, relying on a long-term project that did not start with Erling Haaland or Martin Odega.
While many countries are busy searching for the “next star”, Norway has worked to build an entire system that can consistently produce stars, making its experience a model worth studying for Egypt, which has a huge fan base and talent, no less than many European countries, but is still looking for a long-term project that turns this potential into sustainable achievements.
