{"id":696050,"date":"2026-01-14T19:43:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-14T19:43:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/696050\/"},"modified":"2026-01-14T19:43:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-14T19:43:11","slug":"egypt-lose-semi-final-to-senegal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/696050\/","title":{"rendered":"Egypt Lose Semi-Final to Senegal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><a data-ail=\"333123\" target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thisisanfield.com\/liverpool-fc\/mohamed-salah\/\" title=\"Mohamed Salah\" rel=\"noopener\">Mohamed Salah<\/a> suffered heartbreak at the hands of <a data-ail=\"333123\" target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thisisanfield.com\/liverpool-fc\/sadio-mane\/\" rel=\"noopener\">Sadio Mane<\/a>\u2018s Senegal once again, with Egypt missing out on a place in the final after a 1-0 defeat.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>There will be no AFCON crown for Salah this year after his journey in the competition came to a heartbreaking end in the semi-finals.<\/p>\n<p>        <b><a data-ail=\"333123\" target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thisisanfield.com\/liverpool-fc\/mohamed-salah\/\" title=\"Mohamed Salah\" rel=\"noopener\">Mohamed Salah<\/a> at AFCON: What next?<\/b><\/p>\n<ul style=\"margin: 15px 0 0 0; padding-left: 20px; list-style-type: disc; color: #333;\">\n<li style=\"margin-bottom: 12px;\">\n            <b>Title hopes end:<\/b> Salah suffered semi-final heartbreak as Egypt fell 1-0 to <a data-ail=\"333123\" target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thisisanfield.com\/liverpool-fc\/sadio-mane\/\" rel=\"noopener\">Sadio Mane<\/a>\u2018s Senegal, ending their hopes of an AFCON title.\n        <\/li>\n<li style=\"margin-bottom: 12px;\">\n            <b>The detail:<\/b> Egypt were defensively stifled, with Salah limited to just 30 touches and zero actions inside the Senegal penalty area across the 90 minutes.\n        <\/li>\n<li style=\"margin-bottom: 0;\">\n            <b>Next step:<\/b> Salah is expected to remain in Morocco for the third-place playoff on Saturday, meaning he would miss the <a data-ail=\"333123\" target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thisisanfield.com\/liverpool-fc\/burnley\/\" rel=\"noopener\">Burnley<\/a> game and be expected back on Merseyside early next week.\n        <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The match itself was not an advertisement for thrilling attacking football, with Egypt failing to muster a shot until after 80 minutes, while Senegal managed 12, four on target, and a goal in that time.<\/p>\n<p>Mane had the decisive moment in the 78th minute, with a fortunate deflection giving him the time and space to hit a powerful strike into the back of the net for 1-0.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Egypt, who had named an unchanged lineup from the side that secured the 3-2 win over Ivory Coast in the quarter-final, were then forced to come out of their shell to force extra time. <\/p>\n<p>Salah was well corralled by <a data-ail=\"333123\" target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thisisanfield.com\/liverpool-fc\/west-ham\/\" rel=\"noopener\">West Ham<\/a>\u2018s Malick Diouf throughout and although Egypt threw on forward after forward, they could not find the equaliser.<\/p>\n<p>Liverpool\u2019s No. 11 had just 30 touches on the night and not a single one was inside Senegal\u2019s penalty box, summing up their defensive strategy.<\/p>\n<p>Senegal have had Egypt\u2019s number in recent years, winning the 2021 final between the two teams and later knocking them out of World Cup contention in 2022.<\/p>\n<p>Will Mo Salah return to play for Liverpool against Burnley?<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/featureimage-378-820x547.jpg\" alt=\"Liverpool's Mohamed Salah is substituted on and Liverpool manager Arne Slot looks on during the Premier League match at Anfield, Liverpool. Picture date: Saturday December 13, 2025.\" width=\"820\" height=\"547\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-331665\"  \/><\/p>\n<p>Egypt\u2019s tournament is not over despite their semi-final defeat, as AFCON will host a third-place playoff between the two semi-final losers.<\/p>\n<p>It means Salah\u2019s side will face either Nigeria or Morocco on Saturday, the day Liverpool host <a data-ail=\"333123\" target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thisisanfield.com\/liverpool-fc\/burnley\/\" rel=\"noopener\">Burnley<\/a> in the <a data-ail=\"333123\" target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thisisanfield.com\/liverpool-fc\/premier-league\/\" rel=\"noopener\">Premier League<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>While it remains to be seen if the 33-year-old will be involved in the Bronze final, he is unlikely to leave his team before the tournament officially ends.<\/p>\n<p>It is a possibility, which will no doubt be confirmed in the days to come, but his likeliest return to Merseyside is the start of next week, when Liverpool travel to Marseille and <a data-ail=\"333123\" target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thisisanfield.com\/liverpool-fc\/bournemouth\/\" rel=\"noopener\">Bournemouth<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mohamed Salah suffered heartbreak at the hands of Sadio Mane\u2018s Senegal once again, with Egypt missing out on&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":696051,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8815],"tags":[67792,748,393,4884,179,1128,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-696050","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-liverpool","8":"tag-afcon","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-liverpool","13":"tag-mohamed-salah","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115895166857803702","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696050","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=696050"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696050\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/696051"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=696050"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=696050"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=696050"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}