Egypt clings to Salah against electric Australia

Australia and Egypt will face each other this Friday (8:00 p.m. Spanish peninsular time) in the round of 32 of the 2026 World Cup in the United States, Mexico and Canada at the AT&T Stadium in Dallas, where ‘the Pharaohs’ will debut in the qualifiers and the Oceanians will have the opportunity to equal their ‘ceiling’ of the round of 16.

Egypt will arrive at the fiefdom of the Dallas Cowboys NFL team, as one of the undefeated teams until now, after adding a victory (1-3) against New Zealand and two draws with the same result (1-1) against Belgium and Iran.

The right winger Mohamed Salah, who is currently without a team after ending his contract with Liverpool FC, knows that it may be the last time he will wear his team’s shield in case of defeat, and his physical condition, with hamstring problems, has made the country of the pyramids hold its breath.

If he were to be able to play, he would have Manchester City player Omar Marmoush at his side, who has not yet debuted in his first World Cup, in addition to having gone six games in a row, since the friendly against Saudi Arabia in March, without having been able to satisfy his hunger for a goal.

For its part, Australia, with Mathew Leckie and Jacob Italiano confirmed to be absent for the entire tournament, went into these matches as second in group D, in which they beat Turkey (2-0) in the first match, lost (2-0) to the co-host United States and tied (0-0) with Paraguay in the last match.

If they beat Egypt, it will be the first time that the Oceanians have won direct qualifiers in a World Cup and they would equal their best result in this competition. ‘The football kangaroos’ reached the round of 16 twice, first against Italy in Germany 2006 and, more recently, in Qatar 2022 against the current champion Argentina.

The ‘Socceroos’ are not known for dominating the game, with an average of 34% in possession of the ball, but at the same time they have great effectiveness in counterattacks, highlighting the speed and individualities of forward Nestory Irankunda, who scored the first goal against ‘the moon and star’.

TECHNICAL SHEET

–POSIBLE ALIGNMENTS:

AUSTRALIA: Beach; Bos, Circati, Souttar, Herrington, Behich; Irvine, O’Neill; Volpato, Metcalfe and Irankunda.

EGYPT: Shobeir; Hany, Ibrahim, Fathy, Hafez; Attia, Saber, Ashur; Salah, Ziko and Marmoush.

–REFEREE: Gustavo Tejera (URU).

–ESTADIO: AT&T Stadium de Dallas.

–TIME: 20:00 (DAZN).