Arsenal midfielder Mohamed Elneny has admitted Egypt's loss in the African Cup of Nations final against Senegal has been tough to accept.

Elneny starred for the Pharaohs in Cameroon, but he could not prevent them losing on penalties to Aliou Cisse's side back in February.

"The Africa Cup of Nations is always something special, for us and the people in Egypt, for the kids who are waiting for it every two years," Elneny told the club's website.

"They were really excited, all my team-mates as well - no one had won it one time [personally]. We won the most titles in Africa, we won it seven times. This makes me want to win it at least one time because we reached the final two times but unfortunately we didn't win.

"I'm really, really proud of my team. [In the knockout stages] we went 120 minutes for three games before the final and this isn't something I think so many teams can do. There's no recovery actually, it's just one day to recover. It's something I'm really, really proud of my team [for].

"Of course it makes me sad when I remember this game, we gave everything. We got to penalties as well, but we know penalties is just in the hands of the gods. No one knows what is going to happen with penalties.

"When we saw the fans when we got back to Egypt, when I listened to my family, I saw how proud they are of us. This makes us [feel] a little bit nice inside because we were broken after the game."