By deciding to snub his already agreed move to English championship side Bristol Rovers, Ahli striker Emad Meteb has shown how close minded just about all Egyptian football players are. It was clear that over the last two seasons the 25-year-old international failed to develop any of his abilities or skills, averaging a poor record of five goals a season despite guaranteeing a starting place in Ahli's offence. The timing would have been perfect for him to kick off a career in Europe and enhance his already undoubted talent. But bizarrely he gave away that opportunity, and the strangest of all is everybody's blessing to his wrong decision and all that was just to play against Zamalek in the African Champions League. How naïve was Meteb when he thought he can play that game after signing for another club? And why? Was it worth it? It was just another boring Ahli - Zamalek game. Acts like these just shows you the total ignorance and recklessness of our players. Since day one Meteb's negotiations with Bristol were dubbed with suspicion and resent from Egyptian media and fans alike. As ignorant as most of them are, the media and the fans still cant accept the idea of an Egyptian playing in a lower division competition in Europe. We still live in that world of our own and think that our so-called football stars are the centre of the universe and if they ever leave Ahli it should only be for the likes of Real Madrid or Arsenal. But that will never happen, apart from Hosni Abd-Rabou, no Egyptian player is good enough to play for a European giant. And with the fact that the Egyptian league is a very weak and humble competition, we cant expect the world's top clubs to come knocking on our doors for players. The other thing is that the English Championship is a very strong and competitive league. Every club has a massive fan base and the level of football played is better than that of the Portuguese, Greek, Belgian and Dutch premier leagues. Also Meteb would have been Bristol's record signing of all time, the club would have treated him as a superstar and offer him all the possible facilities to succeed. We also have to bear in mind that some current African superstars started playing their trade in Europe's lower divisions and that is the way to go up the ranks of real stardom. Didier Drogba was playing for Levallois and Le Mans in France before moving to Marseille and Chelsea, Yakubu Aiyegbeni played in the Israeli league before being Everton's top scorer last season. Once again and like all our players Meteb wasn't smart enough to make the right move, he showed total lack of ambition and opted to stay with Ahli and be the same player he is. Of course the media and all Ahli fans who've reached a point of total selfishness are happy to see him stay. They don't care about a player that could have had a good career in England, they still want a player to stay in the slums of our prestigious Egyptian league, help the club win the mighty league and cup double, qualify to a competition called World Cup for clubs and beat some Kiwi and Mexican teams in the process. Our players, clubs and fans should change their mentalities and the way they see things. If we ever want to be a top football country we have should encourage our players go abroad, learn the real game and take it step by step so we can one day at least reach a world cup.
