Ittihad Alexandria board announced their support for head coach Talaat Youssef after losing two consecutive matches to Harras El-Hodoud and Zamalek in the Egyptian league. “We will continue to support Youssef and are not considering to relieve him from his duties as team coach, nevertheless, he must overcome the last two defeats by winning our coming match against Ismailia,” board member Sayed Al-Thaalabi told reporters on Sunday. Meanwhile, Youssef insisted that he is ready to do whatever the board decided and said that he wont mind quitting if that would be best for the team. “My relation with the board is strong, and if they see that it would be in the team's best interest for me to leave, I wont hesitate in doing so,” Youssef insisted. On the other hand, Ittihad's board allocated LE 226,000 for both legs of their African Confederation Cup campaign. Ittihad vice president Mohamed Meselhi said that the board allocated LE 158,000 for the first leg that will take place either in Rwanda or Ethiopia, and LE 68,000 for the second leg that will take place in Alexandria. Ittihad are seeking to relocate the second-leg to Borg El-Arab stadium to make use of the 80,000 seat capacity, which increases the financial revenue to LE 800,000. The Alexandria-based club sent the Confederation for African Football (CAF) a 24-man squad, that saw the absence of Mohamed Abdul-Satar, Gharib Fathi, Mohamed Hasib, Sayed Gamal, El-Wakil Salama, Basem Wagdi and Sayed Abdul-Moghni.
