SENEGAL’S journey at the 2021 Africa Cup of Nations could not be any more different from Nigeria’s.
While the Super Eagles flew off the blocks at breakneck speed, winning all their group games before crashing out halfway into the competition, Senegal’s progression was slower and steadier.
The Teranga Lions endured a bit of a rough start with just one win and one goal in their first three group games but grew into the tournament and fought their way to the title, the one they had been craving for years.
Nigeria went into the continent’s most important single-sport event with the head coach, Austin Eguavoen, appointed less than a month to the competition; Senegal’s coach Aliou Cisse has been leading the team for seven years.
Of course, there are no foolproof ways to prepare for a football tournament because various factors could determine the outcome, including the talent available, the technical and tactical competence of the coaching crew, key refereeing decisions and sometimes pure luck.
Still, Senegal’s Lions were among the best prepared teams at the 2021 AFCON in Cameroon and they reaped the ultimate reward.
The Teranga Lions have been Africa’s top ranked team by FIFA for about two years, yet they did not carry a superiority complex into the tournament; they worked hard, were consistent, played for each other and played against every opponent with the same intensity.
They were disciplined too, receiving no red card in their seven matches. One of the major reasons Nigeria lost in the round of 16 to Tunisia was the red card issued to Alex Iwobi that hamstrung their attempt to fight back.
So, Senegal had essentially all the ingredients that led to the ultimate triumph. For talent, they had some of the continent’s and world football’s best players in Liverpool forward Sadio Mane, Napoli defender Kalidou Koulibaly and Chelsea goalkeeper, Edouard Mendy.
For technical competence, the Teranga Lions had head coach Aliou Cisse, who has proven his capabilities since taking charge seven years ago. The former captain was driven by a desire to win the title he and his teammates missed by whiskers in 2002, when they lost on penalties to Cameroon in the AFCON final in Bamako, Mali
Since being officially appointed as Teranga Lions head coach in March 2015, 45-year-old Cisse has led the side to qualify for the 2018 World Cup and the 2019 AFCON final, before his efforts were crowned on Sunday in Yaounde.
Cisse, who has a very impressive win rate of over 60 percent with the Lions, would cherish this title even more because Senegal avoided the pitfalls that consumed some of the other highly-rated teams going into the tournament.
Apart from the round of 16 exit of Nigeria, Algeria and Ghana were knocked out in the group stage while Mali, Cote d’Ivoire and Guinea were sent back home in the round of 16, too.
Algeria, who came into the tournament as champions amid a 34-match unbeaten run, were humiliated by Equatorial Guinea and Cote d’Ivoire. Riyad Mahrez and his teammates left Cameroon with just one point from three matches, scoring just one goal while conceding four.
Four-time champions Ghana also got utterly embarrassed in Cameroon after losing two matches and winning none in a group that had Gabon and newcomers Comoros.
The Black Stars had not failed to advance beyond the group stage in decades, and their failure in Cameroon was so stark that head coach Milovan Rajevac was fired days after their return to Accra.
Rajevac had been hired in September primarily to oversee their Qatar 2022 qualifying playoffs, but Ghana’s sports ministry ordered the indecisive football association to sack the Serb.
On the positive side, the tournament in Cameroon provided a massive stage for previously unheralded teams to showcase their abilities.
Comoros and Gambia were making their first-ever appearances in the continental fiesta and were expected to be cannon fodder for the big teams.
