El Classico al Masri…

Last Thursday, April 23, the Military Academy Stadium of Cairo has been the stage for what is often considered as one of the most violent football fixtures in the world or the most important African match: the Cairene derby Zamalek VS Al-Ahly.

Zamalek Sporting Club and Al-Ahly are the Egypt and African’s most successful football clubs, and the derby is considered as the most important match of the season. A victory in the classico is often considered for Cairene as much important as winning the regular league (…should we really trust that?).
After long months of debate on the event’s venue, the match was finally played at the Military Academy Stadium, also known by Egyptians as the Estad El Koleya El Harbeya. The tiny (but cosy) stadium manages to keep only around 30.000 persons, in a derby that normally contains more than three times this amount of people.
While Al-Ahly faced the match with the attempt to give an important step toward the triumph in the Egyptian league (al-dauri), the Zamalek boys, holding a sixth place in the general ranking, just played mindless with the local coach filling the team with young motivated players. Final result was a goalless draw.
Spectacle was definitely not going to be performed on the field, in what has been a quite boring match with really few occasions from both sides. Much interest came from the stadium stands. Supporters of both teams split the stadium in two parts: one completely white-coloured (for Zamalek “White Knights”) and one fully red-coloured (for Al-Ahly “Red Devils”). Red Devils supporters were definitely much more organized respect to the euphoric but much spontaneous white ones. Certainly better organized in comparison to both team supporters was the shorta, the Egyptian police, which occupied the first two seat-lines of the whole stadium, and which divided the supporters with a security cordon from the entrance to the stands. Tight security measures avoided physical confrontation among rival supporters, but did not prevent them from chanting, supporting the respective team or mocking one-another.

Listen here a sound/sawt/resume of the match from the stands of Al-Ahly supporters: Classico

[Recorded with Zoom Handy Recorder H2, internal microphone.]