Al Ahly

Establishment and start of the club

The idea of establishing Al Ahly came in the first 10 years of the 20th century and was firstly raised by Omar Lotfy, who was a student in the Egyptian Law School during his presidency of the High School Students Club. The establishment of a club for high school students was for political reasons along with the students needing a sports club for them to gather for leisure and exercise.

He discussed the idea of establishing the club with a group of friends who were enthusiastic about it and in 1907, Al Ahly was established.

The club was first headed by Alfred Mitchell-Innes, who was a British advisor to the Ministry of Finance at the time. He was the first head to facilitate financial support for the club. An official meeting of the club's board was held on 24 April 1907. The committee met at 5:30 pm in the house of Mitchell-Innes in Giza under his chairmanship and the membership of Idris Ragheb Bey, Ismael Seri Pasha, Amin Sami Pasha, Omar Lotfi Bek and Mohamed Effendi Sherif as secretary.

After the establishment of the club was approved, the main building was designed by architect Ismail Seri, and revised by Mitchell-Innes. A civil company on the behalf of Al Ahly Sports Club was established. Shares of the company were worth £E5 each, and it was the goal of the club when it was established to raise £E5,000. Only £E3,165 were collected over a year which was not enough to fund the establishment. This forced the club to borrow £E1,000 from the National Bank of Egypt in March 1908. Talaat Harb, the president of the Bank of Egypt, contributed £E100 to the establishment of the club.

The first honorary president of the club was the Minister of Education Saad Zaghloul. The name of Al Ahly Sporting Club was suggested by Amine Samy Amin, who suggested that the name is similar to the word "National" in Egyptian Arabic. On 2 April 1908, Mitchell-Innes stepped down as president of the club. Aziz Ezzat was appointed as the new president and became the first Egyptian president of Al Ahly. The official opening ceremony of the club was held in its main building on 26 February 1909.

The game of football was not one of the goals of the founders of Al Ahly SC, but rather to open its doors to students of high schools to meet and practice political dialogues. However, the graduates of high schools who were members of the club developed a passion with football, which prompted the club to build the first stadium in 1909. At the time, they called it Al-Hawsh; colloquially meaning the courtyard in Egyptian Arabic. The stadium was improved over the years, eventually becoming Mokhtar El-Tetsh Stadium.

The first official football team was established in 1911. The team was primary and secondary school players who played football in Al-Hawsh. The names of the first players of Al Ahly were as follows: Hussein Hegazi, Abdel Fattah Taher, Fouad Darwish, Hussein Mansour, and Ibrahim Fahmy.

In 1915, Al Ahly made tours to Egyptian cities to play matches and to spread football and its culture. Al Ahly played in Alexandria, Port Said, Assiut, and Ismailia. The team, led by Hussein Hegazi, faced many teams, including foreign teams belonging to the British Army, which increased the popularity of Al Ahly and the new game in Egypt.

Ahly contributed with Zamalek SC, El Sekka El Hadid SC in the formation of the first football team of Egypt to participate in the 1920 Olympic Games. The club also contributed to the establishment of the Egyptian Football Association.

First titles (1918–1948)

After Al Ahly's refusal to compete with British clubs in the Sultan Hussein Cup in its first edition in 1917, the club's management decided to participate in the 1918 championship as a sign of resistance and to display Egyptian presence in the sport.

In 1923, Al Ahly won their first Sultan Hussain Cup after beating the defending champion Zamalek SC, with them winning six other titles to be the record holder in the number of wins until the last edition in 1938.

They also played an active role in the establishment of the Egyptian Tennis Federation.

The club followed their first win of the Sultan Hussain Cup with the King Farouk Cup in 1924, defeating El Sekka El Hadid 4–1 in the final. The man of the match was Mokhtar Eltetsh, who scored two goals.

In the summer of 1929, Al Ahly's football went on a tour where the team traveled to face several European clubs, such as Fenerbahçe and Galatasaray in Turkey and BFC Preussen, 1860 Munich and Schalke in Germany. The tour ended with Al Ahly playing the last two games in Bulgaria against Levski Sofia and Slavia Sofia. In November 1930, Al Ahly defeated rival Zamalek 4–0 in a match in the Cairo League. In that game, Mokhtar El Tetsh was the first player to score a hat trick in the Cairo Derby. At the end of the 1936–1937 season, Al Ahly managed to win the league in the last round by defeating Zamalek 4–1, finishing three points ahead of their rivals. The club won the King Farouk Cup with a 3–2 victory over El Sekka El Hadid SC.

In 1938, Al Ahly won the last version of the Sultan Hussein Cup, with a 1–0 victory over Al Masry in the final match. The club won the Cairo League, again in the last round, with a 5–1 victory over the second placed Zamalek.

The team traveled to Mandatory Palestine in 1943 on a 23-day tour, headed by Mokhtar El Tetsh, to play several matches with Arab teams to support Palestine against the Zionists.

The decision had been made despite the refusal of the president of the Egyptian Football Association Haider Pasha, due to the pressure from the British position against the Palestinian issue.