Egypt football sentencing sparks unrest.

                                              

Flames rise from a room at the headquarters of the Egyptian Football Association in Cairo on March 9, 2013. By (AFP)

A court verdict over deadly football violence sparked fresh unrest in Egypt on Saturday, with several buildings torched in the capital, as Islamist President Mohamed Morsi faces growing civil unrest.

A Port Said court, sitting in Cairo for security reasons, confirmed death sentences for 21 defendants and handed down life sentences to five people, with 19 receiving lesser jail terms and another 28 exonerated.

Fans of Al-Ahly football club, whose members were killed in a February 2012 stadium riot in Port Said in which 74 people died, had warned police they would retaliate if the defendants were exonerated.

In Cairo, huge flames rose above the main building of the Egyptian Football Association and a police officers' club in an affluent neighbourhood on an island in the Nile.

Residents of Gezira used garden hoses to try to extinguish the flames as a police helicopter circled overhead. Windows were smashed at other buildings in the complex.

The football riot trial has been a ticking time bomb for Morsi, who is facing a revolt in Port Said, growing nationwide unrest and an unprecedented police strike.

The court handed 15-year sentences to the former head of police security, General Essam Samak, and to Brigadier General Mohammed Saad, who was responsible for the stadium gates, which were locked, when the riot broke out.

Seven remaining police defendants were acquitted.

During sentencing, the judge read out a string of names without explaining who they were, leading to much confusion.

"First we were happy when we heard the 21 death sentences. We were cheering and didn't hear the rest of the verdict," one football supporter in Cairo told AFP. "Then we were very angry."

Any verdict in the highly charged trial was likely to trigger angry reactions.