Fired U.S. soccer coach Bob Bradley finalist to be Egypt’s coach

Bob Bradley, fired as coach of the U.S. national soccer team July 28 and replaced the next day by Juergen Klinsmann, is one of three finalists for the vacant position as Egypt’s national team coach.

Also under consideration by the Egyptian Football Assn. (EFA) are Colombia’s Francisco “Paco” Maturana and Serbia’s Zoran Filipovic.

“The EFA board will meet with the three coaches this week to pick one of them,” the EFA announced on its website on Sunday.

Egypt has won the last three African championships — in 2006, 2008 and 2010 — but its failure to qualify for the 2012 tournament led to the June 6 dismissal of Hassan Shehata as coach.

Under Shehata, the Pharaohs climbed to their highest-ever position in the FIFA world rankings when they rose to ninth in 2010. Egypt currently is ranked 36th.

The EFA has been casting about for a successor, but has reportedly been rebuffed by Portuguese coach Nelo Vingada and talks have broken down with French coach Herve Renard.

If he is named to the post, Bradley, 53, would become the first American-born coach to take charge of a foreign national team since Steve Sampson coached Costa Rica.

Bradley was coach of the U.S. when it defeated Egypt, 3-0, in the 2009 FIFA Confederations Cup in South Africa.

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—Grahame L. Jones

Photo: Bob Bradley. Credit: Brian Snyder / Reuters