Ahmed Elmohamady

Ahmed Elmohamady

Personal information
Full name	Ahmed Eissa Elmohamady Abdel Fattah[1]
Date of birth	(1987-09-09) 9 September 1987 (age 24)
Place of birth	Basyoun, Gharbia, Egypt
Height	1.80 m (5 ft 11 in)[2]
Playing position	Right Winger
Club information
Current club	Sunderland
Number	27
Youth career
2003–2004	Ghazl El-Mahalla
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps†	(Gls)†
2004–2006	Ghazl El-Mahalla	7	(3)
2006–2011	ENPPI	53	(9)
2010–2011	→ Sunderland (loan)	36	(0)
2011–	Sunderland	18	(1)
National team‡
2007–	Egypt	43	(2)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of 17:01, 6 Jan 2012 (UTC). † Appearances (Goals). ‡ National team caps and goals correct as of 14:15, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Ahmed Eissa Elmohamady Abdel Fattah (Arabic: أحمد عيسى المحمدى عبد الفتاح‎ born on 9 September 1987) is an Egyptian footballer who plays as a right winger for Premier League club Sunderland. He is widely regarded as one of the future stars of Egyptian football. Elmohamady was part of the Egyptian squads that won the 2008 & 2010 African Nations Cups. Sunderland completed the permanent signing of Elmohamady after he spent the 2010-11 season on loan from ENPPI. He is known for delivering excellent crosses and for his tireless work rate.

Club career

ENPPI

Born in Basyoun, Gharbia, Egypt, Elmohamady started his youth career at Ghazl El-Mahalla in 2003. He started to play for the first team in 2004 at the age of only 17. Despite the strong interest from the Egyptian giants Al-Ahly, it was ENPPI that eventually won his services in June 2006. Although he started his career as a striker with Ghazl El-Mehalla, he quickly established himself as right wing-back after joining ENPPI.^[3] The young talent was called by Egyptian national team's manager, Hassan Shehata, for his first international appearance in 2007.

For a long time, Elmohamady has attracted the attention of several European clubs. However, ENPPI was reluctant to allow him to move to any of them. In summer 2007, ENPPI turned down an offer from Hertha BSC, because the German side failed to meet the Egyptian club's financial demands. The player refused another bid from Rapid Bucureşti of Romania in 2007.^[4]

On 25 November 2008, Elmohamady completed a five-day trial with Premier League side Blackburn Rovers per Rovers' manager Paul Ince request.^[5] Rovers' new manager, Sam Allardyce, sent a senior official to Egypt to initiate talks with the Egyptian club in January 2009.^[6] However, the deal fell through as Allardyce believed it would be difficult for Elmohamady to make immediate impact.^[7]

Sunderland

Elmohamady impressed Sunderland manager Steve Bruce while on trial with the Premier League side in August 2009.^[8] However on 31 January 2010, Sunderland failed to sign him.^[9] Belgian side Club Brugge were also interested in the player and had, according to ENPPI, already made an offer. ENPPI accepted loan bids from both West Bromwich Albion and Sunderland for Elmohamady but while West Brom's offer was larger, Elmohamady chose to go to Sunderland, after being on trial.

On 1 July 2010, Elmohamady joined Sunderland after passing medicals for a season-long loan move from ENPPI for a £500,000 fee, with an option of a permanent deal for £2 million next summer.^[10]

Elmohamady made his debut for Sunderland in their 2-2 draw with Birmingham City on 14 August 2010. He won Man of the Match for his performances against Arsenal and Manchester City. Due to his impressive start at Sunderland, manager Steve Bruce expressed an interest in signing Elmohamady permanently in the January transfer window.

On 11 March 2011, Sunderland announced that they have taken up the option of a £2 million transfer which was included in the loan agreement, making Elmohamady's contract a permanent one on Wearside.

On 9 June 2011, the permanent contract was officially confirmed by Sunderland, with Elmohamady signing a deal which will keep him at the Stadium of Light until 2014. Manager Steve Bruce added, "Ahmed has done well in his first season with the club and has shown plenty of potential. We look forward to helping him grow as a player and I think there is much more to come from him."

Elmohamady started Sunderland's first league game of the 2011-12 season away to Liverpool, and provided the assist for Seb Larsson's debut goal as the Black Cats drew 1-1.^[11] He scored his first goal for Sunderland in a 2-2 draw against West Bromwich Albion on 1 October 2011.^[12]

Elmohamady has fallen out of favour since the departure of Bruce in December 2011, and he has yet to make a start under his replacement, Martin O'Neill. At the end of the 2011-12 season, Elmohamady didn't start one match under the coaching of O'Neill and had made 18 appearances in the entire season. At the end of the season, Elmohamady was surprisingly not transfer listed by Sunderland and included in the team's squad for next season, however, Sunderland had stated that Elmohamady's playing time will not change under O'Neill. Elmohamady had then chosen to leave. In the end of May, Arsenal had stated that they have interest in signing the player while Premier League promoters West Ham have supposedly sent an official offer for the player.

International career

Elmohamady played several times for U21 Egypt national football team, and was a participant in 2007 African Youth Championship which was held in Republic of the Congo, he was the rising star of the Egyptian team and one of the stars of the tournament despite his playing out of position as he played forward.

He made his senior international debut in August 2007 at the age of 20, in a friendly against Côte d'Ivoire in Paris and has played eight of Egypt’s last nine matches before ACN 2008. He's included in the final squad of Egypt which competed in ACN 2008 in Ghana and grabbed the cup, where he played a role as a substitute. Since then, he reserved his place in the starting line up as a Right-back or Winger. He started all Egypt's six games in the second round of FIFA World Cup 2010 Qualifiers.

In the 2009 Confederations Cup, he was sent off in Egypt's opening game against Brazil for deliberately handling Lúcio's goal-bound effort in the last minute, in an effort to save his team losing in the last minute. This resulted in Brazil going on to score the penalty to win the game by 4-3.^[13]

International goals

#	Date	Venue	Opponent	Score	Result	Competition
1.	28 January 2010	Complexo da Sr. da Graça, Benguela, Angola	Benin	1 – 0	2 – 0	2010 African Cup of Nations
2.	20 May 2012	Al Merreikh Stadium, Omdurman, Sudan	Cameroon	1 – 0	2 – 1	Friendly match
Correct as of 19 January 2010[update]

Honors

With Egypt: African Cup of Nations: 2008, 2010

Name

The traditional transliteration is Ahmed Al-Muhammadi. However, at Sunderland, he is officially known as Elmohamady.

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Ahmed Elmohamady

• Ahmed Elmohamady career stats at Soccerbase
• Premier League profile

Egypt squad v t e Egypt squad – 2008 Africa Cup of Nations Winners (6th Title) 1 El-Hadary 2 Fathallah 3 Al-Muhammadi 4 I. Said 5 Shady 6 H. Said 7 Fathy 8 Hosny 9 Zidan 10 Moteab 11 Shawky 12 Gamal 13 El-Sayed 14 Moawad 15 Shaaban 16 Abdel Monsef 17 Hassan 18 Fadl 19 Zaki 20 Gomaa 21 Mostafa 22 Aboutrika 23 Sobhy Coach: Shehata v t e Egypt squad – 2009 FIFA Confederations Cup 1 El-Hadary 2 Fathallah 3 Al-Muhammadi 4 A. Said 5 A. Khairy 6 H. Said 7 A. Fathy 8 Hosny 9 Zidan 10 Eid 11 M. Shawky 12 Homos 13 Tawfik 14 Moawad 15 Farag 16 Wahid 17 A. Hassan 18 Abdel-Ghani 19 Abougrisha 20 Gomaa 21 Raouf 22 Aboutrika 23 Sobhy Coach: Shehata v t e Egypt squad – 2010 Africa Cup of Nations Winners (7th title) 1 El-Hadary 2 Fathalla 3 Al-Muhammadi 4 Salem 5 El-Saqua 6 Saïd 7 Fathy 8 Abd Rabo 9 Zidan 10 Moteab 11 Abdel Malek 12 Ghaly 13 Tawfik 14 Moawad 15 Gedo 16 El-Sayed 17 Hassan(c) 18 Shikabala 19 Abdel-Shafy 20 Gomaa 21 Raouf 22 Hamdy 23 Abou El-Saoud Coach: Shehata