An-Najah News - The director of the first Egyptian football team, Mohamed Barakat, said that the Arab Cup championship that is expected to be held in Qatar during the period from 1 to 18 December is official, not friendly.

Regarding the possibility of the Egyptian national team in the Arab Cup championship to be assisted by its professionals in Europe, including Liverpool star, Mohamed Salah. Barakat explained, "It will be difficult to include professionals in Europe for the teams in the Arab Cup championship, but it is possible to include professional players in the Arab leagues."

Regarding the Egyptian national team’s preparations for the upcoming matches, Barakat said that we are following all the players whether in the Egyptian league or professionals, and it is possible to include new players to the team during the coming period such as one of the defenders of the Ghazl Mahallah team.

He added that "we have learned a lot from the Egyptian national team journey in the qualifiers for the African Cup of the Nations and of course this will benefit us during the 2022 world cup qualifiers".

On granting the captaincy of the Egyptian national team to Salah, Barakat commented, saying, “Hossam Al-Badri, coach of the Egyptian national team did not open the captaincy file until after the Egyptian team qualified for the African Nations Cup, and everyone welcomed Mohamed Salah as he is given the leadership, and no one, including Ahmed Hijazi, objected".

The draw for the 2021 Arab Cup was drawn yesterday, Tuesday, in the Qatari capital, Doha and it placed the Egyptian team in group number four, next to Algeria, the winner of the Lebanon-Djibouti confrontation and the qualifier from the Libya-Sudan confrontation.