AFCON
How Egypt’s ‘water bottle’ game failed Egypt against Senegal in AFCON final
Egypt goalkeeper Mohamed Qotb Abou Gabal Ali Gabaski yet again grabbed all the attention with his ‘water bottle’ tricks in his country’s African Cup of Nations final game against Senegal.
The Pharaohs lost 4-2 on penalties with Gabaski earning all the applauds for a stunning show.
He made eight saves including, Sadio Mane’s 7th minutes’ penalty without the help of his water bottle.
His goalkeeping heroics could however be attributed to the ‘water bottle’ tricks that earned him fame in the semi-final match against Cameroon.
The bottle had a print of all the Senegal player’s preferred angles. Unlike the semi-finals against Cameroon, it fairly failed although he guessed four directions out of the five penalties right.
For the first penalty, he guessed right but Kalidou Koulobaly added power and thus Gabaski could not reach it.
The Zamalek goalkeeper again went the right way for Senegal’s second but couldn’t reach it as Abou Diallo placed it beyond the goalkeeper.
Mohamed Abdelmonem stepped up for Egypt’s second and missed after Zizu had scored the first.
Bouna Sarr picked up Senegal’s third and this time Gabaski dived early and made the save to keep Egypt in the game.
Marwan Hamdi scored to draw the North Africans level, 2-2
Olympique Marseille Bamba Dieng stepped up and sent Gabaski the wrong way to score Senegal’s fourth spot-kick.
Mohanad Lasheen missed with Sadio Mane wrapping it up for Senegal with a powerful effort although Gabaski for the fourth time went the right way but could not save it.
Gabaski won the man-of-the-match award for an impressive show in the final. He ended the tournament as the goalkeeper with the most penalty saves.
Despite the loss, football fans hailed the goalkeeper for his amazing performance throughout the tournament.
-Ghanaweb
The Libyan Football Federation (LFF) has sacked its Serbian coach, Milutin Sredojević who is popularly known as Micho.
This is coming ahead of Libya’s back-to-back Africa Cup of Nations clashes with Nigeria next month.
Paradoxically, Sports Village Square gathered that the coach’s contract was only recently renewed for six months before the axe fell on the Serbian.
His sack was precipitated by the results obtained in their teo matches of the AFCON qualifiers.
Libya drew 1-1 with Rwanda at home and lost 2-1 away to Benin Republic despite beig a goal up at half time.
The Libyan side, Mediterranean Knights are due to play against the Nigeria Super Eagles in Uyo on 6 October while the return leg holds on 14 October at the 11 July Stadium in Tripoli.
According to information Sports Village Square gathered from Tripoli, the Mediterranean Knights’ coach, Micho led the Libyan national team to win nine matches since taking over in October of last year, he failed to build a strong team due to his poor choices.
He also took a risk with the footballers chosen in the AFCON qualifiers, and the result was shocking to the Libyan sports audience.
According to sources close to the Libyan Football Federation, there is a strong tendency to sign a national coach to lead the Libyan team during the remaining qualifiers for the African Cup of Nations.
CAF President Patrice Motsepe has lashed out at Ghana and some other African countries whose home grounds were recently banned from hosting CAF matches owing to inadequate facilities. He made the remarks in Nairobi, Kenya during a press conference,
After the MatchDay 2 of the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers, CAF ruled Ghana’s Baba Yara Stadium in Kumasi as being inadequate to host international matches. Being the only approved ground in the country, Ghana will now look towards either Cote d’Ivoire or Togo for their remaining home matches of the Afcon qualifiers.
Other African countries without approved home grounds are: Djibouti, Chad, Niger, Eritrea, Gabon, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Madagascar, São Tomé and Burundi.
Motsepe voiced his frustration over the recurring issue of nations being unable to host home games.
“Nothing frustrates me more than a national team or club side having to play home matches outside,” he stated.
He stressed the significance of playing in front of home fans, adding, “You can’t grow football if the national teams or club sides aren’t playing in front of their home fans.”
Motsepe reiterated CAF’s commitment to working with countries to ensure they have at least one suitable stadium to host international fixtures.
“Our conversations in every country are to make sure there is at least one stadium capable of hosting a CAF category C game,” he emphasized.
The on-going CAF AFCON Cote d’Ivoire 2023 Coaches Symposium in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire has brought together, the last three coaches that handled the Nigeria national football team.
Gernot Rohr, Jose Peseiro and Austin Eguavoen are part of the the elite coaches currently gathered in Abidjan.
Gernot Rohr whose tenure of 5 years and 55 matches is the longest ever by any coach in Nigeria, is currently handling Nigeria’s Africa Cupof Nations and World Cup qualifying rivals, Benin Republic. He was succeeded in the interim by Austin Eguavoen who is currently having another interim stint.
Peseiro left his position after the Africa Cup of Nations
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