Egypt coach Hassan Shehata has demanded more from his team as they continue the defence of their African Nations Cup title with a Group C tie against Sudan Saturday.
The Pharaohs, five-time champions, outclassed four-time winners Cameroon 4-2 on Tuesday but Shehata said he is convinced they will beat the Nile Crocodiles to stay on course for a successful title defence.
"Obviously, the team played well against Cameroon and throughly deserved the victory but I still want more from them because we want to keep the cup in Egypt," said Shehata.
Egypt's campaign has received a massive boost with the availability of influential skipper Ahmed Hassan after a two-match ban while Al-Ahly star forward Mohamed Aboutrika has fully recovered from flu after coming on as a second-half substitute against Cameroon.
Hamburg striker Mohamed Zidan grabbed a brace and made another goal to help dump the Indomitable Lions.
Sudan's Alaeldin Ahmed has insisted that as much as the Egyptians looked impressive against Cameroon, this Nile derby will be a different proposition.
"We have worked hard since our loss to Zambia (in their opener). We also are familiar with the Egyptians," said the Al Merreikh ace.
Egypt's supremacy over their neigbours is underscored by the fact that they have won 16 of the 23 encounters between the two countries as well as netting a total of 48 goals.
"We like to work under pressure because that has often brought out the best in the players," said coach Mohamed Abdallah, who combines the national team job with handling 2007 CAF Confederation Cup finalists Al Merreikh.
"We also know we can do a lot better than what we did against Zambia, particularly up front. The Zambian strikers took their chances well and had we done same in the first half, we could have been talking about a different outcome today."
A lot of responsibility will therefore be on the broad shoulders of big centre-forward Faisat Agab, who laboured to find the back of the Zambian net to no avail. The Al Merreikh skipper is a classic target man and grabbed five goals to propel Sudan back to the finals 32 years after their last appearance.
The squad in Ghana is made up of players from only the country's top two teams, Al Hilal and Al Merreikh, and this possibly explains the common bond among the Nile Crocodiles so much so that they observe their Muslim prayers as a team.