In the forthcoming 2024-2025 season, Al-Ahly Club will debut in the Egyptian Women’s Premier League, which has been active since 1999.
The Al-Ahly Board of Directors is heavily investing in its women’s football team, which has become one of the primary requirements for acquiring a professional club license from the Egyptian and African Football Associations “CAF”.
The club will participate in the 2024-2025 season of the Women’s Football League, to comply with the demands of the African Football Confederation (CAF), according to Forbes.
The CAF announced that clubs must create a women’s department to participate in the regional African tournaments. This has become one of the criteria for obtaining a professional club license.
The club’s first decision was to appoint Shady Mohamed, the former men’s team captain, as the sporting director of the women’s soccer department. Mohamed’s first mission was appointing a head coach, and his choice fell on Dimitri Lipoff.
Al-Ahly club announced, in a statement published on its website, that French coach Dimitri Lipoff has been appointed as the technical director of the women’s soccer team for the upcoming three years.
Between December 2016 and November 2018, the 40-year-old served as an assistant coach for the technical staff of the Chinese women’s team Dalian Yingbo FC, where he won four titles and two bronze medals in the cup.
He subsequently departed to serve as an assistant coach with the Chinese women’s soccer team Jiangsu Suning from February 2019 until February 2020, with whom he won four titles.
From February 2020 until January 2022, he worked as an assistant coach and manager at the WFC Wuhan Chedu Jiangda Academy in China, where he helped the women’s team win two titles.
The French added: “When Al-Ahly contacted me, I did not hesitate to accept the offer. I agreed immediately and did not set any conditions during the negotiations.”
“My contract is for 3 years with Al-Ahly and I hope that the journey will continue for a long time with the club of the century.”
The club also announced that Hakima Boucetta, a former Algerian women’s national soccer team player, Has Been appointed as an assistant coach on the technical staff of the French coach.
Boucetta’s fluency in more than one language made this choice easy. Being fluent in French means she will facilitate the communication between Lipoff and the players instead of eventually counting on a translator.
Hakima Boucetta is considered one of the best Algerian players throughout history. She played for the Abu Dhabi team in the Emirates and won a number of championships with them before switching to a managerial career, where she began coaching her former team. She then had spells with Smouha (Egypt) and Al-Amal (Saudi Arabia).
