Egypt: Striker suspended for incident against rival team with mystery punishment

An Egyptian striker has been suspended for an incident when his club was playing a rival team.

2 min read

19 April, 2023

Mahmoud Kahraba or simply Kahraba is an Egyptian professional footballer who plays for Al Ahly and the Egypt national team [source: Getty]

Al-Ahly striker Kahraba was suspended this week for an incident during a match against his former team Zamalek in January but neither the Egyptian Football Association (EFA) nor his club has revealed any details of the punishment.

The 29-year-old Egyptian international was alleged by Zamalek to have joined with Al-Ahly fans in chanting insults at their rival club after contributing a goal to a 3-0 victory in the Cairo derby.

The suspension was not imposed, however, until after Kahraba had scored Al-Ahly's second goal and won the Man of the Match award in a 2-0 league victory over Smouha on Monday.

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Kahraba, whose acrimonious departure from Zamalek to Portuguese club Aves in 2019 ended up in the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), has denied chanting anything offensive after the January derby.

No punishment has been meted out by the EFA to the Al-Ahly fans for the chanting, as would be normal in such a case.

The EFA did not disclose the details of Kahraba's punishment and declined to elaborate when contacted by Reuters, saying only that Al-Ahly had been informed.

Al-Ahly said in a statement that the club had been informed and that the punishment would be discussed at a board meeting on Wednesday.

The board meeting was called after a group of Al-Ahly fans demanded the club withdrew from the Egyptian Super Cup clash with Zamalek in Abu Dhabi on May 5.

Kahraba has scored eight goals in 13 matches since returning in January from a six-month suspension imposed on him by FIFA for breaking his contract with Zamalek to join Aves.

The player insisted his contract with Zamalek was incorrectly registered but CAS ruled against him in March last year.

CAS ordered him to pay $2 million with interest backdated to 2019 in compensation to his former club and Zamalek in January asked FIFA to ban Kahraba for none payment.

Reports in the Egyptian media said Kahraba was set to miss 12 matches because of the suspension and had been fined one million Egyptian pounds ($32,366).