Egypt's Heartbreaking 85-82 Loss to Australia Opens FIBA U17 World Cup with Nail-biting Drama

Egypt's Heartbreaking 85-82 Loss to Australia Opens FIBA U17 World Cup with Nail-biting Drama

The young pharaohs were the first African nation to secure a qualification spot at the 2024 FIBA U17 World Cup, which will be hosted at Turkey's Ahmet Comert Sports Hall. At precisely 1:30 p.m. local Turkish time on June 29, 2024, Coach Amr's proteges, clad in their national colours, entered the sparsely populated Ahmet Comert Sports Hall.

These two national programs are familiar with each other, having been in the same group twice during the qualifiers for the 2012 and 2022 World Cups. The Aussies, who finished sixth in the 2022 World Cup, emerged victorious on both occasions. The score was 88-73 in the first instance, while in the most recent encounter two years ago, it was 91-46.

Despite this, the Egyptians started confidently and quickly took a 5-0 lead. However, under pressure from their opponents, they conceded a 5-5 tie and managed to win the first quarter 14-13. Things worsened in the second period, with the Australian team gaining the upper hand by capitalising on several turnovers (14 of which occurred in the first period alone).

Although both teams had the upper hand in the second period, three minutes before halftime, the tide was clearly turning in favour of the Australians, who initially led 30-23 but ended the period leading 41-29 at halftime.

The Australian bench made a significant contribution, scoring 25 points, while the Egyptian bench managed only three. This disparity was reflected in the second period, which Australia won by 13 points, 28-15. The game became more evenly balanced following substitutions, with the Egyptian team scoring 15 points. However, there was no improvement in terms of ball possession, with 20 turnovers.

Although the third quarter ended 62-49, Australia edged the North Africans by one point by the end of the period, 21-20. Could the young pharaohs reverse their fortunes and overcome this daunting challenge?

Rami Magdy spearheaded the charge, allowing his team to close the gap to just five points with a minute and a half left in the match. With 21 points, he was the game's leading scorer. With thirty seconds left, the Egyptians trailed their opponents 82-83. Mido missed his opportunity on a throw-in, relinquishing possession to their opponents.

With twelve seconds remaining, the Egyptian team resorted to fouling to regain possession, but unfortunately, the final score was 82-85, with no marked improvement between the two teams.

[Photography / Images Courtesy of FIBA]