I couldn’t cope with life in Moscow, says Zaki

New Zamalek signing Amr Zaki insisted that he didn’t fail in his short spell at Russian club Lokomotiv Moscow, and stressed that he was forced to return to Egypt after failing to adapt to Moscow’s cold weather.

كتب : Amro Hassan

الأربعاء، 07 يونيو 2006 - 19:58
New Zamalek signing Amr Zaki insisted that he didn’t fail in his short spell at Russian club Lokomotiv Moscow, and stressed that he was forced to return to Egypt after failing to adapt to Moscow’s cold weather.

"My return to Egypt doesn’t mean I failed in Europe, I just couldn’t cope with life in Russia and the freezing climate there," Zaki told FilGoal.com exclusively on Wednesday.

The 23-year-old striker arrived from Moscow on Tuesday and immediately inked his contract with Zamalek after agreeing to all of the personal terms with club president Mortada Mansour.

Zaki, who has not played a competitive match since joining Lokomotiv in March, told FilGoal.com that he fulfilled his dream by joining one of the biggest football clubs in Egypt, Africa and the Arab world.

"My knee injury isn’t chronic, I've played with it for the past two years and it has never affected my game, the German physician also insisted that I don’t need an operation and that I'll be back very soon," Zaki added.

The former Enppi striker played a pivotal role in Egypt's African Cup of Nations victory in January after scoring the winning goal against Senegal in the semi-final clash and scored 9 league goals for his former club Enppi last season.

Zaki refused to reveal the details of the contract he signed with Mansour, saying that: "These details concern me and Zamalek only and I refuse to talk about them."

Meanwhile, Zamalek have postponed the press conference in which Zaki was scheduled to be revealed until Lokomotiv's vice president arrives in Cairo next Saturday.

On the other hand, the Zamalek board have accepted assistant coach Ahmed Ramzi's proposal to raise the players’ bonuses for their recent Egyptian Cup win to EGP 50,000 each, after the club qualified to the quarter-finals following a 5-2 victory over Arab Contractors.