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2008 Men’s African
Clubs Champions Championship-
Misurata, Libya |
Quarterfinals
Ahly, Zamalek
of Egypt, Esperance of Tunisia and Swehli of Libya to
semis
 Misurata,
Libya, April 14, 2008- The big Favorites Al Ahly and
Zamalek of Egypt, Esperance of Tunisia and Swehli of
Libya secured their tickets to the semifinal of the 2008
Men’s African Clubs Champions Championship after their
victories in the quarterfinal matches here at Misurata,
Libya on Monday. Al Ahly of Egypt defeated their home
team El Guish, while Zamalek defeated easily Ahli
Tripoli of Libya. Esperance ended the hopes of the other
Libyan team and Swehli of Libya became the only team
from the organizing country to qualify to the semifinal
and also the first Libyan team to reach this stage in
the history of the competition.
In the play off for the 9-12 positions FAP of Cameroon
defeated VC Force of RD Congo, while Daim Hamad of Sudan
took over Sonel of Cameroon.
The competition will be resumed on Wednesday with the
two semifinal matches as Al Ahly meets Swehli of Libya
and Zamalek plays Esperance in what is called early
final. The same day will feature two matches in play off
for 5 to 8 positions including a purely Libyan clash
between Ahly Tripoli and Ahly Beni Ghazi and another
match between El Guish of Egypt and GSU of Kenya.
The day will show also FAP meets Daim Hamad of Sudan for
the 9th and 10th positions while VC Force of RD Congo
plays Sonel for the 11th and 12th positions.
The matches were attended by more than 3000 spectators
led by Local Organizing committee president Ayad El
Misurati, Control Committee President Abdelhadi Ghzali,
Referee commission president Hassan Ahmed, CC member
Morkinyo and CAVB technical director Mrs. Howyda Mondy.
El Guish vs. Al Ahly Egypt
 In
a purely Egyptian face of, Al Ahly took over their
compatriot El Guish 3-1 (25-19, 25-21, 23-25, 25-19) in
94 minutes of thriller performance. The winners use
their potent service that allowed them to disturb the
defense of the opponent. Ahly captain Hamdi El Safi
played a great role with his big experience to bring
this victory that allowed his team to take the revenge
from El Guish That costs them to lose the local league
against the big arc rivals Zamalek. Al Ahly qualified to
the semifinal to meet Swehli of Libya, while El Guish
will play for the 5-8 position play off against GSU of
Kenya.
Al Ahly head coach Noor Attia was happy with both the
victory and his team’s performance that was the best
this season in his opinion. “We suffered a lot this
season from the overload put on my players who
constitute 75% of the national team, but I think all the
key players today played their best.” He said.
El Guish started the match using the strong wing spikers
Mohamed Gabal in position 2 and Nathan and Islam Awad in
position 4 so they led steadily till they reached 8-7 at
the first technical timeout (FTT). Suddenly Al Ahly
players reached to their top performance in this
competition as the team captain El Safi and Mahmoud
Raouf sent their rockets from position 4 as well as the
usual efficient spikes of Ahmed Salah who played his
best to allow Ahly to come back and lead 16-10. El Guish
players were shocked and disturbed for a while and that
made them undisciplined to face Ahly attacks and thus
Ahly continued their way to win the set 25-19.
The second set showed early dominance for Ahly after
successful spikes from El Safi and Salah with the
impermeable block of Abdelatif Otham and Hossam Shaarawy
so they led 8-5 and 16-8. Guish head coach Foad Abdel
Salam substituted his setter Ahmed Samir by the
Experienced Maged Moustafa and thus they returned back
to the match with the spikes of Gabal and the block of
Emmanuel Jitto to decrease the point deficit from 17-9
to 20-18. Ahly returned back on time to win the set
25-21.
The third set showed early dominance for Ahly as they
led 8-5 due to the strong spike service of most of the
players. When Ahly was in the way to have a straight
sets victory, their performance acutely dropped to allow
El Guish to recover as the reception improved and the
spikes became more potent so they succeeded to win the
critical point and win 25-23.
Ahly returned back in the fourth set and made it one
side game through the floating service of El Safi and
Salah and succeeded to lead widely 16-7 before they
continued their high performance to win the set and the
match 3-1.
Esperance vs. Ahly Beni Ghazi
Esperance of Tunisia was too strong that Ahly Beni Ghazi
of Libya couldn’t withstand more than three sets as the
Tunisian team won 3-0 (25-11, 25-15, 25-21) to qualify
to the semifinal. Esperance will meet Zamalek in the
semifinal while Ahly Beni Ghazi plays Ahly Tripoli in
the play off of 5-8 positions.
The Tunisian team started with the main line up and
succeeded to control the net action regularly through
the centers Skander Ben Tara and Stankovic and thus they
led widely in the first set 25-11.
Ahly Beni Ghazi tried their best in the second set
through adjusting their block and backline defense so
they stayed near for some time before Esperance
continued through the spikes of Marouane Fehri and
Belaid to win the set 25-15.
In the third set the Esperance head coach made some
substitutions to save the power of his players but still
he had the upper hand till Ahly started to use their
spikers El Muntaser El Farawi and Moustafa Ibrahim so
they decrease the point deficit to 17-16 before the
Tunisian team with some substitutes won the set 25-21
and the match in straight sets
Zamalek vs. Ahly Tripoli
Zamalek played a highly professional match to defeat
Ahly Tripoli of Libya 3-0 (25-17, 25-19, 25-13) in only
57 minutes. The national team setter setter Ashraf Aboul
Hassan and the powerful left attacker Mohamed Abdel
Monem led the Egyptian champions to win the match, the
first with his skills of attacking combinations by the
net and the second with his unstoppable hits sent from
all net positions. Zamalek led the match all through due
to their dominant block by the net, while Ahly team
complains of bad reception and back line defense that
didn’t allow them to use the attacking strategy.
GSU vs. Swehli
Swehli of Libya became the only team of the organizing
country to qualify to the semifinal stage when they
clinched a very difficult victory over GSU of Kenya in
five set match 3-2 (21-25, 25-21, 23-25, 25-22, 15-12)
in two hours of volleyball exciting actions.
The first set was one of the best all through the day as
it went point by point till GSU led gradually through
the spikes of Bernard Musumba and David Kebemfi and won
the set 25-21. The second set showed a completely
different performance as they used the right attacker
Mahdi Gara to continuously penetrate from position 2.
the setter Ibrahim Obied used his combinations to
deceive the strong Kenyan block and Mohamed Ben ouhida
sent his spikes with the disciplined block of Hani
Abdulwahab to win the set 25-21.
The third set showed more thrills after the spectators
filling the hall became more excited so GSU led at the
start through the efficient spikes of Elphas Biwott and
Musumba and stayed ahead although the powerfull spikes
from the left handed Mahdi Gara. GSU finaly settled the
set 25-23 to lead 2-1 in sets.
Again Swehli rebounded in the fourth set where they used
frequently the fast attacks by the net through the
centers Ahmed Faraj and Ouhida, then the match star Gara
used his strong spike services to give his team the lead
16-12 and continued 20-16. GSU deployed their block
against the strong Libyan attacks and succeeded to
decrease the point’s deficit to 22-20. Swehli aided by
the spectators succeeded to end the set 25-22 and to
extend the set to tiebreak.
The tiebreak showed severe struggling from the home team
and succeeded to win the critical points using the
undisciplined block of GSU to win the set 15-12.
Play off 9-12
VC Force vs. FAP
FAP of Cameroon achieved their competition first victory
over VC Force of RD Congo 3-0 (25-18, 25-18, 25-22) in
62 minutes. FAP meets Daim Hamad of Sudan for the 9th
and 10th positions while VC Force plays Sonel for the
11th and 12th positions.
Sonel vs. Daim Hamad
Daim Hamad of Sudan achieved the first victory for
Sudanese team in this competition over Sonel of Cameroon
3-1 (25-22, 25-22, 21-25, 25-17) in 77 minutes. Daim
hamad played a very good match full of all volleyball
skills and ensured that they are very promising team in
future.
Third Round Program Wednesday 16 April
Semifinal 1-4
Zamalek (Egypt) vs. Esperance (Tunisia)
Ahly (Egypt) vs. Swehli (Libya)
Play off 5-8
Ahly Tripoli (Libya) vs. Ahly Beni Ghazi (Libya)
GSU (Kenya) vs. El Guish (Egypt)
Ranking 9-10
FAP (Cameroon) vs. Daim Hamad (Sudan)
Ranking 11-12
Sonel (Cameroon) vs. VC Force (RD Congo)
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