 Shawky Ghareeb has quit as the coach of the Egypt under-23 squad |
Egypt's national under-23 has quit after a humiliating 3-1 defeat to Tunisia at home, in a qualifying match for the 2004 Athens Olympics. The Egyptian Football Federation has decided to accept the resignation of Shawky Ghareeb, after his third straight loss in the Olympic qualifiers..
At the halfway stage of the qualifying campaign, Egypt are bottom of Group A without a single point from their three matches.
It is still Mathematically possible for Egypt to make it to Athens, but their chances are all but over with only the group winners advancing.
The poor performance is something of a surprise given that a similar squad under the same coach won the bronze medal at the Fifa World Youth Championship in Argentina 2001.
The Egyptian FA had been banking on the football team to bring the country its first Olympic medal since 1984.
The loss to Tunisia follows defeats at home to Nigeria and away to Senegal, both by two goals to nil.
Hassan Shehatta, who coached the under-20 team the recent World Youth Championship in the UAE, has been named by the FA as Ghareeb's replacement for the next qualifying matches.
Egypt's next Olympic qualifier is the return match in Tunisia on the weekend of the 21-22 February.
Ghareeb is the second casualty of the weekend's Olympic qualifiers after Musa Abdullahi was sacked from his post as coach of the Nigerian under-23 team.
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