Hisham of GVO covered the Algerian side of the online feud and tension over the decisive football match due to take place in Cairo on November 14. The encounter will determine which of the two teams will qualify to next year's FIFA World Cup in South Africa. Some Egyptian bloggers enjoy a game with a twist.
Sue of AdBasha posted the Coca-Cola TV ad supporting the national team and wrote:
In what can only be called a brilliant initiative, CocaCola brings its fans an utter sense of nostalgia, mixed with goosebumps and smiles and even loud laughter.
With their latest National Football Team sponsorship campaign, "1989" marks some of the best commercial content I've seen in a long while.20 years ago, same two teams, same crucial crossroad, same month…Egypt and Algeria met for a World Cup qualifying game; A Special Dedication to 80 Million Egyptians.
Zeinobia called the campaign a beautiful marketing disaster:
If you hear tomorrow that angry Algerian hooligans have crashed every single Coca Cola bottle in their country , do not be surprised.
If you hear tomorrow that someone has set the Coca Cola factory there on fire do not be surprised.
If you find that the Algerians are calling for boycotting Coke do not be surprised.
Despite how beautiful this ad is from the artistic point of view , I do not know if it is the suitable time to release it in this tension between the two countries.
The Algerian FM has visited Egypt to speak with his Egyptian counterpart and there is talk that the presidents of both countries will attend the match in order to ensure maximum security , I do not know about the Algerian President’s security but I know ours very well.
Henkel came up with a counter campaign entitled, "From Egyptian mothers to the Egyptian team":
Meanwhile, MohAly is fed up with all the noise:
I am definitely cheering for Egypt, I even will allow my students to leave 30 mins early to watch the match, but I still can't see why is it as important as October war (as some papers have written)?! Does this mean if Algeria wins, it will be another Naksa that will take another 40 years to fix its consequences. I am wondering that we have reached a stage where I wish that we take our work as serious as we are dealing with football issues!
Football is the opium of the masses and in Egypt it is used to distract people from real issues but what about Algeria, Zeinobia thinks that:
Algeria is suffering from the similar problems that we have in Egypt and driving anger and despair. They are headed by sick president who refuses to leave his place , an army that controls the country, ghost of terrorism moving around and youth that want to leave the country in every possible way because of the economic conditions !!
The Egyptians and Algerians love their countries so much and are extremely angry that they feel helpless in front all these challenges despite they are not ; they just need a strong motive , a strong and real motive not a pseudo match for 90 minutes.
SandMonkey summed up the war explaining how the Egyptians are gearing up:
There is a football tradition of killing owls in order to jinx your opposing team. It has been relayed to me that an Owl holocaust was started last week and is continuing until this very moment.
Tamer from the popular TV show el beit beitak went on TV a couple of days ago and informed the Egyptian audiences of the Hotel the Algerian team will be staying in, and urging the Egyptian people to “go there and hang out” until the day of the game.
How the Algerians retaliated
Algerian airlines has donated 3000 free tickets to hardcore Algerian fans in order not to have their team stand by its lonesome against the cheering might of 80,000 Egyptians.
Algerian hackers hacked the Egyptian football association webpage today, and put the Israeli flag on it (??!!!?).
Algerian municipality workers have stopped the paperwork for an Algerian girl getting married to an Egyptian guy, telling her that she can come back for it after Saturday’s game.
And what happened one day before the game
Zeinobia thinks this video is sad:
It is very sad because it will be much better if I had heard those football fans screaming “We Want better education , We Want better health care system, We Want clean water and clean streets, We Want better salaries and better food , We Want democracy , We want our rights backs “ but unfortunately all what I heard was “We Want tickets” !!! It was just loud lost scream !!
- Egyptians dying for a ticket to the Game attacked all ticket selling centers in droves today. The Elite Heliopolis Sporting club managed to secure a couple of thousand tickets to sell to its members, only to have word of this reaching the Egyptian population and having hundreds of Egyptians storm into the private club to get their hands on tickets. 40 police cars were called to secure the facility.
- The Bus carrying the Algerian team got attacked today, with Egyptian fans reportedly attacking it by throwing rocks at them. And then this is where the story gets hazy: The Algerians claim that the rock throwing reached such a degree, that the windows chatters and 4 of their players got injured. The Egyptian officials deny that any Algerian players got injured, and some are even claiming that the Algerians are making the entire thing up, with them breaking the glass of the bus themselves to set the Egyptians up. There are videos here and here. You make up your own mind.
- Egyptians dying for a ticket to the Game attacked all ticket selling centers in droves today. The Elite Heliopolis Sporting club managed to secure a couple of thousand tickets to sell to its members, only to have word of this reaching the Egyptian population and having hundreds of Egyptians storm into the private club to get their hands on tickets. 40 police cars were called to secure the facility.
- The Bus carrying the Algerian team got attacked today, with Egyptian fans reportedly attacking it by throwing rocks at them. And then this is where the story gets hazy: The Algerians claim that the rock throwing reached such a degree, that the windows chatters and 4 of their players got injured. The Egyptian officials deny that any Algerian players got injured, and some are even claiming that the Algerians are making the entire thing up, with them breaking the glass of the bus themselves to set the Egyptians up. There are videos here and here. You make up your own mind.
