CAF Confederation Cup
BLOW FOR ENYIMBA AHEAD OF MUST-WIN CLASH WITH ORLANDO PIRATES
Nigerian club Enyimba will be without suspended captain and leading scorer Augustine Oladapo when they host South African outfit Orlando Pirates on Wednesday in a crucial CAF Confederation Cup group game.
Only a final-round victory against the unbeaten Buccaneers will give the twice African champions a chance of a top-two finish and qualification for the quarter-finals.
“I knew this group would go down to the wire. We must collect maximum points against Pirates to keep alive our hopes of becoming the first winners from Nigeria,” said Enyimba coach Fatai Osho.
Entente Setif of Algeria host Al Ahly Benghazi of Libya in the other Group A fixture and all four clubs have a chance of reaching the knockout stage.
Here, AFP Sport previews matchday 6 with already-qualified clubs in two of the other three sections striving to finish first, and avoid other group winners in the draw.
Group A
Enyimba hope the dribbling skills of rising star Anayo Iwuala can help unlock a Pirates defence that has conceded only one goal in eight qualifying and group matches.
That goal was scored by Oladapo, but it could not prevent the Nigerian visitors losing 2-1 in Soweto with Tshegofatso Mabasa snatching a late winner.
Enyimba have won their last four CAF home matches, all by one-goal margins, and a 1-0 win or a two-goal victory will ensure they finish above Pirates on head-to-head record, and progress.
Group B
Victory for leaders and six-time CAF title winners JS Kabylie of Algeria at home to bottom club NAPSA Stars of Zambia will seal first place.
Kabylie lead Coton Sport of Cameroon on head-to-head and have what should prove an easier finish as the central Africans must visit 2020 title-holders Renaissance Berkane of Morocco.
Berkane, the fifth Moroccan club to win the African equivalent of the UEFA Europa League, will want to bow out on a high note after two losses and two draws since defeating NAPSA in the opening round.
Group C
Second-place CS Sfaxien of Tunisia will be wary of Papa Paye when they host surprise leaders Jaraaf of Senegal in a match that will decide who tops the standings.
Paye has scored in the last three rounds, with two goals proving match-winners, as the Dakar outfit recovered from collecting only one point from a possible six in the first two matchdays.
Record three-time Confederation Cup winners Sfaxien also boast a consistent scorer in Firas Chaouat, whose combined CAF Champions League/Confederation Cup goal tally this season is nine.
Group D
Only pride is at stake in this section with 2018 title-holders Raja Casablanca of Morocco assured of first place and 2020 runners-up Pyramids of Egypt finishing second.
Forwards Soufiane Rahimi and Congolese Ben Malango have impressed for Raja, who are shaping up as title favourites having won all five group matches with an 11-0 goal record.
Raja finish off at home to poor travellers Nkana of Zambia, who have never won in north Africa, while Pyramids host Namungo, a Tanzanian team that have lost their five group matches without scoring.
AFP
CAF Confederation Cup
CAF adjudges Morocco’s Youssef Mehri’s goal as the fastest in football history
Moroccan club, Renaissance de Berkane, beat their Algerian counterparts, CS Constantine, 4-0 in the first leg of the CAF Confederation Cup semi-finals at the weekend.
The game got off to a dream start for the Moroccan club as it took Youssef Mehri less than a minute to open the scoring in the big win against the Algerians.
Officially, the goal is recorded to have been scored after 13 seconds.
In a post on X (formerly Twitter), CAF remarks: “Youssef Mehri goes straight into the history books. The RS Berkane striker scores the fastest goal ever scored in the CAF Cup.”
A deeper search by Sports Village Square indicates that a Nigerian player, Paul Onuachu, had previously scored a faster goal, but not in a CAF Cup duel.
The basketball player-like footballer scored his first international goal in a 1-0 defeat of Egypt on 26 March 2019.
The goal inflicted Nigeria’s first defeat on Egypt in 29 years. But more significant was the timing of the goal. Onuachu, within eight seconds of kick-off, undoubtedly entered the record books as the second fastest goal in international football records after that of Germany’s Lukas Podolsk, who scored after six seconds in a friendly against Ecuador in 2013.
Fans had hardly settled down at the Stephen Keshi Stadium in Asaba for the Nigeria versus Egypt match when Onuachu released a thunderous shot that turned out to be the match’s decider.
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The Renaissance Sportive de Berkane delegation will travel to Algeria this Friday to face CS Constantine in the CAF Cup. Tension may be building up for the potentially explosive confrontation that could have a build-up from last year’s fixtures of the Moroccan club and another Algerian outfit, USM Algiers, in the CAF Confederation Cup.
A Moroccan news outlet, Sport.le360, reports that a Tunisian airline will operate the direct flight between Oujda-Angad Airport, which is located about 12 kilometres north of Oujda and about 600 kilometres northeast of Casablanca, near the Algerian border and Constantine Mohamed Boudiaf International Airport.
Last year, political differences between Morocco and Algeria scuttled similar semi-final clashes between clubs of both countries.
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The Court of Arbitration for Sport on Wednesday ruled in favour of the Algerian football federation in a row over a map of Morocco on shirts worn by Renaissance Berkane in the 2024 CAF Confederation Cup.
Algerian club USM Alger were kicked out of last year’s competition after both legs of their semi-final against Berkane were cancelled because of a diplomatic dispute.
Neither match took place as USMA and the Algerian authorities objected to a map of Morocco on the Berkane shirts which included Western Sahara.
Algeria cut diplomatic ties with North African neighbours Morocco in 2021, partly over the Western Sahara issue.
The former Spanish colony is largely controlled by Morocco but claimed by the Algeria-backed Polisario Front, which seeks the territory’s independence.
The Confederation of African Football awarded Berkane a 3-0 victory for both legs of the semi-final.
CAF at the time responded to an appeal by the Algerian FA by ruling in favour of Berkane, saying the club had been wearing the same jerseys since the start of the tournament.
But the Algerian FA took the case to sport’s highest court in Switzerland, which determined that the shirts in question were “contrary to CAF regulations, as they display a territorial map that is of a political nature.”
“The image of a map of Morocco including Western Sahara on the shirts of RS Berkane depicts a message, a demonstration or propaganda of a political nature as it represents the assertion of a territorial dispute that is contested and still unresolved as of today,” CAS said in a statement.
“By the laws of the game of the International Football Association Board, it is prohibited to convey any content of a political nature on all equipment, including shirts.”
CAS added that the initial decision by CAF to “maintain the approval of the shirts is annulled”, but the court said that it would have no effect on the results of the tournament.
Egypt’s Zamalek beat Berkane on away goals in the final.
-AFP
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