Al-Ahli is edging closer to snatch its 100th title as it is marking its centenary anniversary

Perhaps this season is the most illustrious in Al-Ahli’s 100-year history. Having won the African Champions League title for the fifth time, ended third in the Club World Cup in Japan, won the Super African Cup, snatching the National Football League title this season would be the perfect celebration the Red Devils could have while it marks its 100th anniversary this year.
The list of achievements is becoming weightier month after month. Earlier this month, the team occupied the 22nd place among world clubs in the International Federation of Football History and Statistics’ (IFFHS) monthly club rankings. It came ahead of all Arab and African clubs by far, thanks to its outstanding performance during the past month locally and continentally. It also came ahead of internationally renown, well-established teams like River Plate of Argentine, Bayern Munchen, Verder Bremen, Schalke of Germany, Tottenham of England, Real Madrid and Valencia of Spain, Santos of Brazil, Porto and Benefica of Portugal, Eindhoven of the Netherlands and Parma of Italy.
The list of achievements also became weightier when the club dominated the CAF awards for the year 2006, having claimed three prizes in different categories. In a gala that took place in the Ghanaian capital Accra last month, the Red Devils have been named club of the year. Its manager Manuel Jose was elected the best coach after outdoing Egypt’s national coach Hassan Shehata and Asec Abidjan’s Patrick Liewig. Up till now, Jose has clinched 11 championships for the Devils during his two separate tenures at the helm of the team.
In addition, Mohamed Abu Treika has claimed the best player award in the Inter-Club player of the year category, having surpassed Tunisian Sfaxien’s Abdel-Karim Nafti, who has already signed for the team to wear its jersey starting from next season.
To celebrate the centenary anniversary and the great achievements of the football team, Al-Ahli is scheduled to meet Barcelona, the European Champions League title holder, within the coming few weeks in Cairo. The Spanish team’s president Joan Laporta will arrive in Cairo soon to agree with Al-Ahli’s officials on a friendly game between both sides to commemorate the anniversary of one of Africa’s oldest clubs.
In fact, the team is taking confident steps towards achieving its third consecutive title as it leads the standings since the beginning of the second half of the competition. After playing 23 games, the Red Devils are on top of the league with 62 points. Having achieved 20 wins and two draws, the team has scored 55 goals. It outdid its challenger Ismaili with 14 points, though the coastal city team still has one game in hand. And despite the red team still has to go through two hard-fought encounters with Ismaili and Zamalek, it’s highly unlikely that the red jerseys will let the most prestigious local title to slip from their hands.
Although the team lost the services of its outstanding midfielder Mohamed Abu Treika and Mohamed Barakat during the last period, it managed to get the better of Tersana, the Coastal Guards, and Misri of Port Said. Thanks to its talented Angolan import Flavio, who comes on top of the league’s goal-scorers with 17 goals, the team managed to edge closer to their favourite trophy.
Ismaili and Zamalek are going to fight for the runners-up position to book a ticket for the African Champions League next year. With only seven games left, Ismaili is perhaps closer to snatch the second position as it lies ahead of the Cairene team with five points.
Except for the sudden revival of the oil club team Enppi, the rest of the teams are still relatively in their same positions. Enppi, under the leadership of former Egyptian international Hani Ramzi, succeeded to escape the “danger area” in which it lied since the beginning of the competition. It rose to occupy seventh place with 30 points. Meanwhile, Petrojet came in eighth place with the same number of points.
Petrol Assiut, which lags behind in 14th place with 19 points only, has to exert its utmost efforts if it wants to continue in the premier league next season.

By Mohamed El-Sayed