Egypt camp in Qatar, Shikabala goes AWOL

Egypt's national football team will travel to Qatar this weekend where they will set up their training camp after the Pharaohs’ scheduled friendly games were cancelled in the wake of the 1 February Port Said tragedy. The seven-time African champions, who are currently preparing for 2013 African Cup of Nations qualifiers under American coach Bob Bradley, were supposed to play Uganda on 23 February, three days before meeting Guinea. They are also slated to take on Niger on the last day of the month. It has been reported that the former USA coach had threatened to resign unless his team was provided with a training camp abroad in the run-up to next year's tournament. "The Egyptian Football Association sponsor reached an agreement to set up a training camp in Qatar for the national team starting 25 February. We will look for other teams with which to play friendlies if we fail to set new dates for matches with Uganda, Guinea and Niger," EFA spokesman Azmy Megahed was quoted as saying by Ahram Sports. "We were obliged to accept that solution, given Bradley's insistence on holding the camp abroad and the sponsor's threats to sue the EFA," added Megahed. All Egyptian football activity has been suspended since the Port Said Stadium disaster, which left more than 74 football fans dead and hundreds injured.   Injury sidelines El-Sayed, Shikabala goes AWOL Zamalek goalkeeper Abdel-Wahed El-Sayed has been left out of training after aggravating an injury in a Champions League preliminary round game against Tanzania's Young Africans. El-Sayed's teammate, Mahmoud Abdel-Razek "Shikabala," had been supposed to join up with the Egyptian squad, but failed to show up for unknown reasons. "We allowed Zamalek players to rest yesterday after their arrival from Tanzania. Our doctor examined Abdel-Wahed, who needs two weeks to recover. We couldn’t reach Shikabala," Egypt’s goalkeeping coach Zaki Abdel-Fattah said. From Al-ahram