Yesterday, the 26th of October, the Egyptian Football Association announced a new format for the 2020-2021 season in the Second, Third and Fourth Divisions, according to the situation created by the COVID-19 pandemic.
The main news is that relegation from all divisions is cancelled for the 2019-2020 season, except for the Egyptian Premier League, which is not the object of the announcement. This means that the 15 teams initially relegated from the Second Division to the Third Division, including Fayoum SC, would stay in the Second Division. While in the last years the number of teams in the Second Division decreased gradually from 48 to 42 and then to 36, aiming at further reduction and the creation of a professional Second Division, for the 2020-2021 season the number of teams will increase back again to 48, distributed among three groups of 16 teams according to their geographical location. These are the same three groups which existed so far, except that they had 12 teams in 2019-2020. None of these teams is relegated, but 12 teams from the Third Division would be promoted, actually the winners of each of the 12 groups in the Third Division.
The 48 teams in the 2020-2021 Second Division would be therefore the following: 3 teams relegated from the Premier League, 33 teams from the 2019-2020 Second Division (all, except for the 3 group winners, which are promoted to the Premier League) and 12 teams promoted from the 2019-2020 Third Division. Most likely, just like before, Group A will include teams from the Upper and Middle Egypt, and perhaps one or two teams from Cairo area; Group B will include teams from Cairo and the East (Suez Canal area); Group C will include teams from Alexandria and the North-West. The winner of each group would promote to the Premier League.
The registration and transfer of players will be allowed until the 21st of November 2020, and the competition will start on the 25th of November 2020. There will be a double round robin championship, each team meeting each other team twice, once at home and once away, a total of 30 rounds, to be finished probably in May 2021.
The Third Division will have 177 teams (155 remaining teams and 22 teams promoted from the Fourth Division), distributed among 12 groups. The Fourth Division will have at least the existing 352 teams, and possibly other newly-created teams that might join this division.
The Egyptian Football Association also announced that they will provide more information about the format of the competitions in the near future.
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