Tempers reach boiling point

James Montague

• Last Updated: November 14. 2009 2:27PM UAE / November 14. 2009 10:27AM GMT

Within an hour the footage of the attack had been edited and uploaded on to the internet. The first video was dark and shaky, occasionally zooming into a huge hole that had been blown through the coach window. The second showed the aftermath: several Algerian national team players showing their injuries, blood pouring from head wounds.

The initial reaction from the Egyptian authorities was to deny that the attack took place, feeding into a popular belief that the Algerians would use the incident to call off the game. The government-run daily newspaper Al Ahram accused the Algerians of fabricating the incident.

Algeria had expected a rough reception on their arrival in Cairo for the crucial World Cup play-off against Egypt. What they hadn’t expected was for the team bus to be attacked by rock throwing youths minutes after leaving the airport, injuring four players.

“They let them do it,” defender Antar Yahia told Algerian state radio, accusing Egyptian security guards of standing back and allowing the attack to happen. “You can’t launch five kilo rocks from 50 metres. They let them do it and watched. It’s shameful. In our home game we welcomed them with flowers.”

The president of the Algerian Football Association demanded the game be called off citing safety fears. History is repeating itself. On its own, a do-or-die match against regional rivals for a place at the World Cup would stir passions.

But this game is much more than that. The match tonight comes almost two decades after both teams played in similar circumstances for a place at Italia ‘90. The game was marred by violence between players and fans of such ferocity that it has soured relations between the two countries.

Egypt won that game 1-0 but, incensed by defeat, the fighting continued after the game, culminating in the Egyptian team doctor losing an eye. Algerian legend and former African Player of the Year, Lakhdar Belloumi, was convicted in his absence for causing the injury and an international warrant was issued for his arrest. Belloumi remained a virtual prisoner in his home country whilst always claiming his innocence, pointing the finger at a former teammate in an interview with Algerian daily Echorouk last September. The incident was finally resolved in a special ceremony before last June’s encounter between the two teams, which Egypt lost 3-1, when Algeria’s president Abdellaziz Bouteflika personally intervened. Despite the attempted détente, tensions have been steadily rising for a month since Egypt beat Zambia so that the required permutations would be known: Egypt need to win by three clear goals, Algeria merely draw. A 2-0 victory will produce a dead heat.

Fifa have already held a draw in Geneva to decide that Sudan will be the venue for a play-off next Wednesday, if it is required.

Suspicion is everywhere. There have been no press conferences and training has been closed to the media, lest any tactical secrets are leaked. The league was suspended so that the team could prepare properly for the game, but the move has had one unforeseen effect: the Egyptian press has filled the vacuum with incessant coverage of the build up which has stoked the animus between the two countries.

The media, both in Algeria and Egypt, have been trading insults, invoking the “Spirit of ’89” and using war-like imagery in their coverage. Shoot, Egypt’s popular weekly football newspaper, ran with the game on all 20 pages. On the front page was a scene from the film 300, the Egyptian players’ faces superimposed on the soldiers. At the front, leading the charge with Egyptian flag in hand, was the coach Hassan Shehata.

The headline read: “Attack”, written in Arabic and smeared in blood.

“The Egyptians are so scared they are trying any means,” explained Elias Filal, one of 2,000 Algerians who had travelled to Egypt to watch the game, outside the Algerian embassy. “It has become a dirty game in the press.

“It is a war in the media only,” agreed Fodil Lyes, a correspondent for Echorouk, before the attack on the team bus. “The people have a good relationship. But Saturday is another day.”

sports@thenational.ae