As he strolled past the assembled media, Essam El-Hadary allowed himself a smile before taking a bite from the apple grasped in his left hand.
It was a gesture of complete satisfaction, from a man who knew his work for the night was done – and done perfectly.
El-Hadary knows that feeling well – he has been doing a job between the posts for Egypt for more than 20 years
In fact, when he made his international debut, on March 26, 1996, his opposite number from Wednesday night, the talented Kouakou Herve Koffi, was still six months from being born.
El-Hadary became the Africa Cup of Nations’ oldest player when he came off the bench in Egypt’s first game at this tournament. He is 44 now, and shows no sign of slowing down, attributing his longevity to hard work and good genes.
Back when the Egyptian keeper won his first Cup of Nations in 1998, Ramadan Sobhi, the Stoke winger, who is the youngest member of the current squad, was just a year old.
In fact, El-Hadary has a daughter the same age as his youngest team-mate, but he insists it doesn’t make a difference to how he treats the winger.
The player who is almost at the same age as my daughter… I treat all my team-mates as brothers and I treat him just like a team-mate,’ said the veteran earlier in the tournament.
‘I embrace them all and I am always around them giving advice because this is part of my job as a team captain and friend. I don’t make them feel the gap in the age because I believe this should be normal.’
He might claim it is normal, but the man Didier Drogba once labelled his ‘best opponent’ – high praise given the goalkeepers Drogba faced in the Premier League, Champions League and beyond – is on the verge of something exceptional.
A win in the final, where Egypt will face either Cameroon or Ghana, would be his fifth continental title, having lifted the trophy in 1998, 2006, 2008 and 2010. At the moment he shares the record of four wins with former team-mate Ahmed Hassan – a fifth would put him out on his own as the most successful ever.
Along the way, El-Hadary has set personal records too. The 10 hours and 53 minutes he went on the pitch between the 25th-minute of the 2010 quarter-final and Aristide Bance’s equaliser on Wednesday night without conceding a single goal was a remarkable feat.
The 153 caps he has accrued since that first one in 1996 also make him Egypt’s most capped goalkeeper – only Gianluigi Buffon, Iker Casillas and Saudi Arabia’s Mohamed Al-Deayea have played more international games between the sticks.
All the while El-Hadary remains as he always was. It seems odd to think of a goalkeeper who has been around in international football for 21 years as unreliable, but it is still the case that the best save he made on Wednesday came from his own error, and that is not atypical.
He prefers to punch crosses rather than catch them – which wouldn’t be a problem except that he mostly tends to flap at the ball instead. He collapses at any physical contact, and seems to stay down longer than most. His time-wasting tactics are legendary.
This tournament has seen him concede only once, but that has been down to a tremendous backline more than to his own brilliance.
And yet, there is something inherently loveable about the old-timer. The prayers on the pitch before Wednesday’s shoot-out. The obvious affection his team-mates hold for him. And the absolute refusal to go away.
El-Hadary is one more win from being a record-breaker yet again, but it is wrong to say he is a game away from greatness. He achieved that long ago.
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