Salah and Mané fight for World Cup ticket in Egypt v Senegal rematch

“Lads, count down, …10/9/8/7/6/5/4/3/2/1 2022 World Cup Final Ignition,” tweeted Carlos Queiroz on Monday. “It took us a long and hard road to reach this deserved opportunity. We know certainly the challenge we face here. There is no room for sorrys or tomorrows.”

The Egypt coach who twice served as an assistant to Sir Alex Ferguson at Manchester United may not have won many friends with his defensive tactics in the Pharaohs’ run to February’s Africa Cup of Nations final. But 47 days after Egypt’s shootout defeat by Aliou Cissé’s Senegal in Yaoundé, the sides will come face-to-face again in Cairo on Friday for the first leg of a World Cup play-off. For Queiroz it is a revenge mission he has clearly been relishing.

“With courage, team-intelligent work and pride we can fly and nothing is impossible,” he wrote in his next tweet. “Once we have to do it, let’s do it with style and bravery, and make the ‘nothings’ possible.”

Fears for Queiroz that his team may have to navigate a way past the new African champions without Mohamed Salah, after the forward limped off during Liverpool’s win over Brighton last week, have dissipated despite Salah missing Sunday’s FA Cup tie against Nottingham Forest. Sadio Mané was also rested by Jürgen Klopp, leading to speculation that the Liverpool manager was trying not to hand either country an advantage in a tie he could probably have done without amid a quadruple-chasing campaign.

A distraught Salah had to be consoled by Mané in Yaoundé after watching on as his clubmate, who had missed a penalty in normal time, held his nerve to win the Afcon final shootout. Salah had been due to take Egypt’s fifth spot-kick.

Mané insisted last month that the pair “don’t even talk about” events in the