AFCON
Escape to victory … Cameroon labour to beat 10-man, ‘goalkeeper-less’ heavily depleted Comoros
What an oddity! Defender Chaker Alhadhur started in goal for Comoros who were without their recognised goalkeepers for the last 16 match at the Stade Olembe in Yaoundé.
Seven minutes into the ‘absurd’ fixtures the already heavily incapacitiated debutantants were wickedly reduced to 10 men by the referee when their skipper, Nadjim Abdou was sent off after struggle for ball possession with Cameroon’s Moumi Ngamaleu.
Yet the brave debutants whose entire squad was drawn from lowly recruits from the lower, lower French leagues.
Before the match, dozens of their players were not available, including the three registered goalkeepers, yet they braved all odds.
With a man down Comoros put up brave performance against the Indomitable Lions. Andre Onana had to be at his best to keep Cameroon in the match, the Ajax goalkeeper pulled the first save of the match inside two minutes.
Onana parried away Youssouf M’Changama free kick before Collins Fai cleared the rebound.
Aboubakar was presented a great chance to increase his tournament tally, when Ekambi found him in space but his effort went wide.
Ekambi scored from a Aboubakar’s pass to ease the pressure on the home faithful with a well taken strike.
Onana denied Comoros with a double save to keep Cameroon’s lead on 32 minutes. Ahmed Mogni fired a low goal bound strike which Onana turned away before blocking Mohamed Baki’s follow up strike.
The second half was more open with both side creating chances while both goalkeepers pulled brilliant saves.
Chaker Alhadhur denied Aboubakar seven minutes after the restart with a great save.
Aboubakar found the back of the net but he was flagged offside on 64 minutes as Cameroon search for the winner.
The tournament’s leading scorer got his goal on 70 minutes to become the first player in the 21st century to score more than 5 goals in a single TotalEnergies Africa Cup of Nations finals.
Comoros pulled a goal back from Youssouf M’Changama’s long range free kick to set up for a thrilling end.
Onana had earlier saved Abdallah Ali Mohamed and El Fardou Ben Mohamed to send the hosts through.
The Indomitable Lions will face The Gambia who beat Guinea to progress to the quarter finals
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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