APR’s African Champions league opposition Egyptian side Zamalek played their league without the injured Amr Zaki when they took on Baladeya in the Egyptian League yesterday. The prolific hitman was left out of the team’s 18-man squad for the game after sustaining an injury in the 1-0 defeat to Ismaili. Zamalek under-fire coach Ruud Krol dealt with a striking crisis as Mostafa Gaafar also missed out on the Baladeya match due to lack of match fitnessHowever, the Dutchman welcomed back Gamal Hamza and Alaa Abdul-Ghani after the duo served a one-match suspension. Despite committing a fatal error against Ismaili, goalkeeper Mohamed Abdul-Monsef started as regular custodian Abdul-Wahed Al-Sayed failed to recover from injury he sustained against APR last week in time. Krol should turn around Zamalek fortunes if he is to save his job. The league runners-up lie fifth in the league table with 27 points. Zamalek are on the verge of advancing to the CAF Champions League round of 32 after claiming a 2-1 away victory over APR in the competition’s opener. The military side has to beat Zamalek in the second-leg in Cairo if they are to reach the next round. Zamalek’s international trio Amr Zaki, Tarek Al-Sayed and Mahmoud Fathallah started the game despite their late arrival in Kigali after contributing to Egypt’s Nations Cup glory. The Cairo giants were looking to avenge their painful 4-1 defeat to APR in 2004 which threw them out of the Champions League preliminaries. Ends
