Today, Friday, April 24th, marks the 44th anniversary of the strangest decision that many Sudanese, and football fans in particular, consider a game destroyer, and that Sudanese football is still paying for it today.
The incident is due to a violation in the summit game on the "Health Revolution Cup", between Hilal and Mars, on Monday April 24, 1976, in riots between the players of the two teams, which ended with the decision of the late match, Mahmoud Hamdi, to expel the goalkeeper, Marsman Tayeb Sanad, and the match was completed. Al Hilal team won, but things did not stop there.
With the whistle sounding at the end of the match with the victory of Al-Hilal with a clean goal, which was scored by legend Ali Qaqreen in the 70th minute, the crescent fans spread with victory, and began chanting the slogan, "Who is your father?" Ali Qaqreen, "a distortion of a famous chant, which was widespread at the time about the late Sudanese President, Jaafar al-Numayri," Who is your father? Nimeiri ».
This distorted chanting resulted in a decision by the then Minister of Sports, Zine El Abidine Mohamed Ahmed Abdel Qader, to freeze all competitions, stop the travel of delegations abroad, free all players from their teams, freeze the accounts of clubs and unions, and switch to what is called "mass sport", which is to practice Sports inside residential areas only.
The Sudanese sports critic, Mustafa Aidroos, confirmed to «Emirates Today» that the ill-considered decision caused the writing of the death certificate of the Sudanese football, and led to its destruction, even if it was without a direct intention by the government authorities at the time, considering that the prestige that the national team had The Sudanese specifically ended irreversibly.
The President of the Football Association, Dr. Kamal Shaddad, said in previous statements that, due to stopping the sporting activity in April 1976, and turning the sport into a mass, all prominent and influential Sudanese players immigrated to the Gulf states, and that Al Hilal team lost at least 30 players. The largest group settled in the Emirates, and the Mars team was also affected by the migration of a large group of influential players.
Among the most prominent players who migrated after the decision to stop football activity in Sudan and settled in the Emirates, Al-Fadil Santo, Mu'tasim Hamouri, and Faisal Al-Korean, from Mars, while from Al-Hilal, Muhammad Hussein Kassala, Mahjoub Al-Dab, Abdo Mustafa, Shwatin, Khader Al-Korean, and other distinguished players Others. Although the authorities reversed their decision on January 10, 1977, this was late.
It is noteworthy that the generation that witnessed the decision of "mass sport" was an extension of a group of players who achieved the title of the African Cup of Nations in the seventh edition of 1970, and were close to qualifying for the 1970 World Cup, after reaching the final round of the African qualifiers, alongside Morocco and Nigeria.
- Distorted chanting by the masses that caused a shocking decision by the authorities against all components of Sudanese football in 1976.