Ahly to host Mazembe in closed-door Champions League opener
Ahly will have to do without their fans when they host DR Congo's TP Mazembe in their opening African Champions League group-stage game next Sunday.
Mazembe, the 2009 and 2010 Champions League winners, have recently demanded that the Confederation of African Football (CAF) move their scheduled game against Ahly to a venue outside Egypt, in light of prevailing security concerns.
Ahly has insisted the match be held in Cairo, however, albeit behind closed doors. Since February's Port Said stadium disaster, Egypt's interior ministry has refused to provide security at football games.
"Our fans will not be attending the match," Ahly, the record winners of Africa's premier club competition with six titles under their belt, said in a brief statement published on their website.
Earlier this year, the interior ministry set ten safety 'requirements' that must be met by Egyptian clubs if it is to provide security at domestic matches.
Ahly are currently playing in Group B of the Champions League, along with bitter rivals Zamalek, Mazembe and Ghana's Chelsea.
Ahram Online
Video
Spot Lights
BBC SportWhen it's put to him that he might be the most talented athlete in the world to hold a racquet, a bashful Ramy Ashour admits "that's pretty great".The 25-year-old Egyptian is more than just the current squash world number one - his elastic, unorthodox brilliance and charisma could be the key to squash breaking out beyond its four walls and regaining a place on the wider sporting
Ministers in Prime Minister Hisham Qandil's cabinet following the recent reshuffle (new appointees are in italics): 1. Minister of Agriculture Ahmed Mahmoud Ali El-Gizawi2. Minister of Antiquities Ahmed Eissa3. Minister of Aviation Wael Maadawi4. Minister of Communication Atef Helmy5. Minister of Culture
AP— April 15, 2013: Two bombs explode in the packed streets near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing three people and injuring more than 140.— January 17, 2011: A backpack bomb is placed along a Martin Luther King Day parade route in Spokane, Washington, meant to kill and injure participants in a civil rights march, but is found and disabled before it can explode. White
The convenient marriage between Iran and the Arab left would have been unthinkable only a few years ago, given the traditional ideological paradoxes between patriarchal Persian Shiism, on the one hand, and leftist orthodoxy on the other.Indeed, a casual viewer of Hizbullah's Al-Manar television, or the Iranian-funded Al-Mayadin TV, these days would probably think that the two Shia propaganda
