JEDDAH, 25 July 2003 — Zamalek’s goalkeeper Abdul Waheed literally had a hand in his side’s 2-1 triumph over Al-Ittihad of Saudi Arabia yesterday in the Saudi-Egyptian Super Cup final at the Cairo International Stadium.
The battle for the President Hosni Mubarak Cup was reduced to a test of nerves and skills from the spot after the two teams failed to resolve the goalless deadlock during the regulation 90 minutes and two sessions of extra time.
And when the match went into the set of penalties, Waheed proved the wee better than Ittihad’s Mabrouk Zayed in stopping the shots. Ittihad’s poor shooting, which was a contributory factor in the match being extended to the extra sessions, once again let them down in the penalty shootout.
The trend of woeful strikes from the spot was set off by Saleh Sagri, whose rising shot rebounded off the left corner of the upright and the bar. Mabrouk, however, kept Ittihad’s hopes alive by stopping Tarek Saeed and Mahmoud Mahmoud to keep the score level-pegging after Abdullah Al-Waked’s straight shot into Waheed.
The first goal of the match came when Rida Tuckar’s straight shot beat a diving Waheed, who had anticipated the ball to the right. But Mabrouk too was beaten by a Sameh Yousuf shot and when Hamza Idrees missed with a poor kick, Zamalek scented victory. Mohammad Siddik did not disappoint the goodly Egyptian crowd with a neat placement to the left of Mabrouk in the next effort, thus sealing Zamalek’s victory when Hassan Al-Yami too found his ball going straight to Waheed. Zamalek, coming off a recent success in Arab League Super Cup last week, thwarted Ittihad’s hopes of making it three in a row in this event. But despite the 2-1 victory margin, the game could have gone either way in the early parts of the game. Both the teams looked the gift horse in the mouth repeatedly, with belated moves and lacking precision in shooting.
Zamalek went on the offensive from the word go, but found the stout Ittihad defense tough to crack. Mabrouk Zayed too proved sharp and as the game wore on, the Saudi outfit slowly stamped their mark.
Employing incisive, short passing mode, Ittihad gained control of the midfield after the first quarter and then hit the throttle in search of a goal. But marksmenship was not their strong point for the day.
In the 23rd minute, Tamer Abdulhameed of Zamalek found himself alone in the box after a short one-two passing bout down the middle. With Mabrouk at his mercy, Tamer sent a high, cracking shot goalward only to find the Ittihad goalkepper soaring to tip the ball out of harm’s way. Ittihad too came close in the 29th minute when Al-Waked’s lob over an advancing Zamalek goalkeeper just went out. But for these close calls, the game was mostly restricted to protracted midfield struggle.
Ittihad continued to apply pressure with some organized moves in the second session, but Zamalek, falling back to defend, held off the Ittihadis. Zamalek came into their own in the last five minutes of the regulation period with some aggressive moves, but they too seemed to have left their shooting boots at home.
One gilt-edged chance came Ittihad’s way in injury time when Idrees moved dangerously down the right flank after collecting a long lob from the center. His shallow center was hastily cleared by a Zamalek defender onto Hassan Al-Yami’s path, but the latter could not hold on to the pass cleanly and the threat was effectively nullified by a regrouping Zamalek defense.
The two extra sessions saw the teams play cautiously, effecting only sporadic raids, and as the time wound down so did the teams, hoping to pit their skills in the penalty strikes. And in this game of chance, Zamalek and Waheed emerged champions.
