Mohammad Salah has urged Egypt fans to support the whole team and not specific players at the AFCON 2021.
The Pharaohs fell to a 1-0 defeat at the hands of Nigeria in their opening Africa Cup of Nations match.
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However, they bounced back against Guinea-Bissau where Salah provided the decisive goal to help his side to a 1-0 victory.
Egypt made it to the knockouts after beating Sudan 1-0 in their final group match.
Salah has been under the spotlight in this tournament as he scored only one goal so far.
The highly-rated forward scored 16 goals in 20 Premier League matches for Liverpool but has failed to replicate that form in Cameroon.
The former Roma star feels that the spotlight being directed at him should be directed to other players.
“ I’m 100% happy with the players and I don’t think I spoke badly about anyone or vice versa. I try as much as possible to pass on the experience that I got playing abroad and help the national team,” Salah said (as per Goal.com).
“I feel that sometimes there are those who are waiting for any excuse to talk about Salah or other players, unfortunately, we live in the era of social media and the national team’s popularity has decreased. People support clubs and fans support players.
“It was not like that before and Egyptian football is now divided. We saw pages created for specific players or clubs, made only to defend them. They think that this is a good thing, but it is not.
“It’s definitely not helpful, you won’t hurt Mohamed Salah because I’ve been through things like that, but it will definitely hurt younger players.
“I don’t come to the national team in order to harass someone or to speak to anyone in a press conference. I have one piece of advice, if you think that I have succeeded abroad, don’t support a particular player or a particular club, for example, Al Ahly fans don’t only talk about Al Ahly players or Zamalek fans don’t only talk about their players.”
Egypt are now set to lock horns with Ivory Coast in the round of 16 today at the Douala Stadium.
The Elephants won their group matches against Equatorial Guinea and Algeria but suffered a draw against Sierra Leone.
Ivory Coast have won two AFCON titles with their most recent success coming in 2015 when they defeated Ghana in the final.
Meanwhile, the Pharaohs have won the continental crown seven times in the past, making them the most successful team in the tournament.
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