Art & Culture

No, Egypt’s WAFCON Jersey Doesn’t Have Seven Stars—Here’s What Actually Happened

BYYassine Hariss

August 3, 2026

Since the 2026 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) began, discussions not centered on the football itself have largely been hijacked by a familiar chorus of meninists determined to litigate grievances few seem genuinely interested in. First came the fixation on attendance figures, with every empty seat presented as definitive proof that women’s football had somehow failed. Then followed the predictable refrain that female players have no claim to equal pay because “no one watches,” conveniently ignoring the decades of unequal investment, limited broadcasting, and institutional neglect that shaped those viewing figures in the first place. The latest flashpoint? The Egypt women’s national team’s jersey.

The argument — for those fortunate enough to have missed it — centered on the seven stars above Egypt’s crest, each representing one of the men’s seven AFCON titles. To many, seeing the women’s team wear the same badge despite never having won continental silverware of their own felt somehow undeserved, as though the stars belonged exclusively to the men’s side rather than to the federation they both represent. It was never a particularly serious issue, but that didn’t stop countless people from treating it as one, eagerly using the debate as yet another opportunity to question the legitimacy of women’s football and, in many cases, disguise plain old misogyny as simple football talk.

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The trouble is, the argument only holds if the premise is true, and in this case it simply isn’t. Egypt has played just one match so far in this year’s edition of the tournament, against Zambia, and the shirt worn on the pitch had no stars whatsoever.

The confusion appears to have originated from a promotional campaign in which several players were photographed wearing the men’s jersey, complete with the seven stars. But that was precisely what it was: a marketing shoot, not a competitive fixture, nor evidence of any change to the women’s match kit. Once that (rather important) distinction is acknowledged, the controversy begins to collapse under its own weight, leaving behind less of a debate about football than yet another reminder of how readily the women’s game is subjected to a level of scrutiny that rarely, if ever, finds its way to the men’s.

Egyptian-Algerian journalist Donia Ismail argues that the debate says a lot about attitudes towards women. “This whole debate once again points to the misogyny at work in this region, and more specifically in this country. It’s not the first time, and it certainly won’t be the last, but it highlights it all over again. It also shows that women’s sport cannot simply be experienced, appreciated, or even exist on its own terms. It is constantly viewed through the lens of men’s sport, especially when comparisons are drawn.”

To her, those comparisons are far from being unique to football, appearing across countless sports and other areas of public life. In her view, they are ultimately used to “mock, diminish, and humiliate women, reinforcing the idea that their value exists only through men’s approval, power, and authority.”

The irony, of course, is that there was never a shirt to object to in the first place, rendering days of online outrage entirely hypothetical. More curious still is the fact that, if anyone’s badge ought to have prompted debate, it was the men’s. For years, the Egyptian men’s national team has worn seven stars above its crest to commemorate its AFCON triumphs, despite FIFA’s regulations reserving stars for FIFA World Cup titles. Ahead of the 2026 World Cup, FIFA reportedly instructed both the Egyptian Football Association and Puma — their official kit sponsors — to remove them for the tournament.

Moroccan sports journalist Omarr Belhaj believes the controversy reflects a much broader pattern in the way women’s football is discussed. “Debates around women’s football so often become symbolic battles about everything except the football itself, whether that’s attendance figures, kits, or whatever the latest controversy happens to be. A lot of people just don’t know enough about women’s football to engage with it in an informed way, so they fall back on these symbolic issues instead of talking about what’s actually happening on the pitch.”

He also argued that this tendency ignores the decades of underinvestment that have shaped the women’s game, making direct comparisons with the men’s side fundamentally misleading. “I think debates like this say less about women’s football than they do about how people choose to engage with it,” he added.

By the time Egypt kicked off against Zambia, the argument had already defeated itself. There were no seven stars on the shirt because there never were and all that remained was a manufactured controversy, amplified by misogyny and misinformation, that ultimately drowned out the football it claimed to care so much about.

No, Egypt’s WAFCON Jersey Doesn’t Have Seven Stars—Here’s What Actually Happened

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No, Egypt’s WAFCON Jersey Doesn’t Have Seven Stars—Here’s What Actually Happened

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