Egypt will wear their FIFA World Cup shirts without the seven stars of their African Cup of Nations victories after they were asked to remove them by FIFA, the Egyptian FA has confirmed.
Traditional Egypt shirts are embroidered with seven stars over their crest to represent their continental victories, but the world footballing body’s guidelines require shirts to be marked only with star awarded for World Cup victories.
The FA was informed about the need to amend the Puma-designed kits several months in advance of the competition and this is normal, a Football Federation media officer, Mohamed Morad Thabet explained.
He also said FIFA had requested the stars and the shirt number, from gold to white for visibility, were adjusted prior to the tournament starting. FIFA guidelines clearly show stars can only be allocated for World Cup wins, with Uruguay a unique case of having stars awarded for their Olympic titles alongside their World Cup successes by FIFA. Egypt are returning to the World Cup finals for the first time since 2018.
Their Group G match at Seattle will be against Belgium, and in their subsequent games they will meet New Zealand in Vancouver and Iran in Seattle, and they will hope for a place in the knockout stages for the first time in the country’s history.
