الشوط الاول بدا.

A natural Egyptian pronunciation is:

esh-shoṭ el-awwal bada

A slightly more careful pronunciation, closer to Standard Arabic spelling, is:

esh-shawṭ el-awwal badaʔ

A few notes:

• الشوط → esh-shoṭ / esh-shawṭ
• الاول → el-awwal
• بدا → bada or badaʔ depending on how clearly the final hamza is pronounced

In everyday speech, exact vowels can vary a bit by speaker.

Because ش is a sun letter.

In Arabic, the l sound of ال often disappears before certain letters called sun letters, and the next consonant gets doubled instead.

So:

• ال + شوط
• becomes pronounced ash-shoṭ / esh-shoṭ, not el-shoṭ

This is a very common pattern in Arabic pronunciation.

شوط often means a round, leg, or half, especially in sports.

In this sentence, because it is followed by الأول (the first), الشوط الأول means:

• the first half

This is very common in football/soccer language.

Because in Arabic, adjectives normally come after the noun.

So:

• الشوط الأول
• literally: the half the-first

But in natural English, that becomes:

• the first half

This is one of the basic word-order differences between English and Arabic.

Because Arabic adjectives agree with the noun in definiteness.

So if the noun is definite:

• الشوط = the half

then the adjective must also be definite:

• الأول = the first

Together:

• الشوط الأول = the first half

If the adjective did not match in definiteness, the phrase would sound wrong.

الأول is an ordinal number, meaning first.

Compare:

• واحد = one
• أول / الأول = first / the first

So Arabic uses a special word for the ordinal, just like English distinguishes one from first.

بدا is in the past/perfect form.

So it means:

• started
• began
• sometimes, depending on context, has started / has begun

Arabic often uses this past form where English might choose either simple past or present perfect.

Because the subject, الشوط, is singular and masculine.

So the verb is also singular masculine:

• الشوط الأول بدا = The first half started

If the subject were feminine singular, you would expect a different ending.

Arabic allows more than one word order.

Here, الشوط الاول بدا is a subject-first structure:

• The first half started

You could also see:

• بدا الشوط الأول

That is more verb-first.

Both are possible, but subject-first word order is very common in speech, especially when the speaker wants to start with the topic: the first half.

In more careful standard spelling, yes, the verb is usually written:

• بدأ

The final hamza is often dropped in casual or less careful writing, especially in informal Arabic writing online or in subtitles.

So:

• بدا may be an informal spelling
• بدأ is the standard spelling

Both point to the same intended meaning here: began / started

It is understandable, but in everyday Egyptian Arabic, many speakers more often use:

• ابتدى
• or بدأ / بدا depending on style and region

So this sentence is fine, but depending on context, an Egyptian speaker might also say:

• الشوط الأول ابتدى

That would also mean The first half started.

Because Arabic is normally written without short vowel marks in everyday texts.

So learners have to know or infer the pronunciation from experience and context.

For example:

• الشوط الاول بدا

is usually read something like:

• esh-shoṭ el-awwal bada

This is normal in Arabic writing, and getting used to it is an important part of learning to read.