Coaches back their players

Al Ahli and Dibbe al Hisn managers stand by UAE-based players' decisions to stay in Africa saying it was the call of the national teams' delegations .

Egypt's Hosny Abd Rabo celebrates after scoring against Angola during their African Cup of Nations quarter-finals in 2008.

The UAE-based coaches have stood firm despite several high-profile international managers wading into the ongoing controversy surrounding the African Cup of Nations in Angola. Following Friday's deadly attack on the Togolese national team in Cabinda province, Hull City manager Phil Brown and Portsmouth chief Peter Storrie both called for their Premier League players to return to England, while the Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola demanded his African players are aware of the dangers they face.

But Abdul Majeed Hussain, the manager of Dubai-based Al Ahli, said the decision whether teams remain in a country recently ravaged by war is solely with the national teams' delegations. Ahli's Egyptian midfielder Hosny Abd Rabo is one of two UAE-based players in Africa for this month's three-week-long tournament. The other is Yao Junior Senaya, a Togolese midfielder who plays for UAE Second Division outfit Dibbe al Hisn.

Hussain said last night he had not spoken with his 25-year-old playmaker and had no way of doing so, but insisted that if the Egyptian national team felt safe to remain in Angola, he would not dispute their decision. "Once he is away from here, he is under his own control. I don't even have his international number," said the Ahli manager of Abd Rabo. "I know it is not easy to live in Africa; for me, these kind of things happen there. All delegations will be under intense pressure: how will they sleep, how will they train, how will their state of mind be? It's not easy.

"This is not a normal situation for a major football event and it is not for me to decide whether they should stay there or leave. I am only seeing it on the TV, they are living there. If they think it is safe, they will stay, otherwise they will be the ones to decide to leave, not me." Dibbe coach Obaid Khasim concurred, insisting the Sharjah-based club would not be calling for their midfielder to return, despite the Togolese team being shot at while travelling between the Republic of Congo and Angola.

Senaya, who has been capped 19 times by Togo and appeared in all three of his country's matches at the 2006 World Cup in Germany, was aboard his national team's bus when separatist militants opened fire on it, killing three people and injuring seven. Senaya escaped unharmed. "If his national team decide to pull out, he will come back to the UAE," said Khasim. "That is the only way. We have not talked to him and we are not going to tell him to withdraw. We have spoken to his wife and she says he is fine.

"Understandably, much like his teammates, he is a little shaken by the attack, but he is unharmed. "I would like him to come back, of course. For me, it is better, but we will not request they return. It is not our place to do so." Senaya was expected to fly with his teammates to Togo last night after captain Emmanuel Adebayor claimed the country's government had demanded they withdraw. @Email:[e-mail]