The Algerian football team was in Cairo to play their crucial African Zone World Cup Group C encounter against old rivals Egypt on  Saturday night. In dramatic style, Egypt got the 2-0 victory they needed against their shocked opponents to force a playoff. And now the decisive playoff between the two teams will be played in Sudan. The winners will book their place in football’s biggest spectacle, which will be held in South Africa in 2010.

History tells us that World Cup qualifiers could be tricky. After all, teams give their all just to earn the right to be a part of the most prestigious sporting extravaganza. So hurt were the Turkish players after their defeat against Switzerland in the European playoff four years ago in Istanbul that they got involved in an ugly fight with some of the Swiss players. Fifa took strict actions then and banned several players who were involved in the fight. In November 2005, Australian national team players were greeted at the Montevideo Airport by hostile Uruguay fans, who screamed and spat at the visitors to intimidate them ahead of that winner-takes-all clash. It seems the footballing world hasn’t learned the lessons from history. Else, the unfortunate incident in Cairo would never have happened. Had the Egyptian authorities given their visitors proper security, the Algerian national football team would have been safe. Those three players, who suffered injuries when their team bus was attacked by hostile fans in Cairo, would have been able to concentrate on the game.

Fifa have warned that they might take action against the Egyptian Football Association for failing to provide the visiting team proper security. “We saw that three players — Khaled Lemmouchia, Rafik Halliche and Rafik Saifi — had been injured. These injuries were not superficial injuries,” Walter Gagg, Fifa representative said.

While the damage has already been done, the pure football fans just hope that one day the global game will defeat its biggest enemy 
— hooliganism.