As Egypt celebrates its Athens medals, another group of the country's athletes believe they can do better The intellectually disabled athletes of Special Olympics Egypt (SOE) think they can do just as well as their able-bodied colleagues in Athens -- and perhaps more so -- in the fourth regional 2004 Middle East and North Africa Games to take place in Tunisia from 4-7 September, Abeer Anwar reports. At a press conference held prior to the departure of the SOE delegation, the athletes shouted "Egypt, Egypt", and hoped for a medal haul. Egypt came out of Athens with one gold medal, one silver and three bronzes, but needed a relatively large number of athletes to do so. The SOE delegation consists of 48 athletes -- 31 men and 17 women -- and 17 coaches. The athletes were thrilled when Magda Moussa, the SOE president, announced that Suzanne Mubarak, Egypt's honorary chairperson, will receive the SOE athletes on their arrival. Special Olympics Egypt chose the athletes after they participated in a number of tryouts in Alexandria, Assiout, Marsa Matrouh, Cairo and Giza. "This time we decided to include athletes from other governorates other than Cairo and Giza," Ashraf El-Ogeil, SOE sports director and deputy president of the Egyptian delegation to Tunisia, said. "We are advocating the Special Olympics strategy of decentralisation so we chose Alexandria, Marsa Matrouh and Assiout. We also included athletes that are taking part in the Games for the first time to give equal chances to all athletes." The SOE delegation is participating in all six sports in addition to initiatives off the field. The floor hockey team consists of 14 players: Sayed Mohamed, Mahmoud Ramadan, Mahmoud Sayed, Adnan Mokhtar, Mustafa Tolba, Mohamed Ragab, Said Ahmed, Mohamed Amin, Ahmed Magdi, Mohamed Ahmed, Mahmoud Mokhtar, Alfred Shoukri, Mohamed Hosni and Ahmed Saber. They are coached by Ahmed Samir, Mohamed El-Gamal and Sherif El-Ashkar. The aquatics team consists of three women and three men: Islam Ibrahim, Hamed Mohamed, Noureddin Hassan, Christine Wadie, Hebattallah Anwar and Heba Salah. Coaches are Amr Mohieddin and Nabila Ahmed. The athletics team comprises four women and four men: Fatma Ali (800m sprint and 100m running), Fatma Abdel-Fattah (100m running and shot-put), Nada Osama (400m running and long jump), Safaa Mahmoud (400m jump and long jump), Shadi Abdel-Moaeti (100m running and shot- put), Mohamed Ezzeddin (100m running and shot-put), Mohamed Hosni (400m running and long jump) and Sari Mohamed (800m and long jump). All athletes will take part in the 4x100m relay. Riham Mohamed and Ayman Galal, the first international athletics instructors in SO Egypt, are the coaches. Nahed Naeem, Mariam Roshdi, Amina Adel, Heba El-Sayed, Dina Mohamed, Youmna Salah, Riham Ahmed and Dina Salah form the basketball team led by coaches Farid Suleiman and Raham Taher. The futsal five-a-side unified football team includes Ahmed Mohamed, Barakat Mahmoud, Mustafa Ahmed, Mohamed Ali, Milad Abdel-Tawab, Omar Hassan, Mohamed Hatem and Mohamed Ahmed. They are trained by Ahmed Abdel-Meguid and Osman Sayed. The table tennis team consists of two women and two men: Mohamed Haidar, Wessam Mohamed, Bousaina Attia and Yousra Ahmed. Coaches are Bassem Mohamed, Suzanne Mustafa and Leila Nasr. Mustafa Galal, an ex-swimmer, is currently the swimming assistant coach as part of the Special Olympics Athlete Leadership Programme to have athletes act as coaches, assistant coaches or board members. To prepare for the MENA Games, all SO Egypt athletes trained at the Students Union headquarters at Agouza. SO Egypt will also be presented in the four events that will take place alongside the Games. Ahmed Shawki will represent Egypt in the Healthy Athlete Programme, Hoda Darwish in the Family Forum, Dina Galal and Hala Ismail in the Athlete Leadership Programme, and Ahmed Thabet, Noureddin Khaled, Mohamed Mahmoud, Ahmed Amr and Mohamed Magdi in the Schools and Youth Summit. "It is a great honour for our athletes to take part in the 4th regional Games," Ismail Osman, SO Egypt chairman, said, "I thank Mrs Suzanne Mubarak for giving a helping hand in making our dream to participate come true." Moussa announced that Vodafone had subsidised SO Egypt in expenses related to participation in the Games.
