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| The Ivory Coast Team |
Ivory Coast emerged the new African champions on Sunday night after they
defeated the Black Stars of Ghana in the final match of the 2015 Africa
Cup of Nations. They won the match played in Bata, Equatorial Guinea
9-8 on penalties in a repeat of the 1992 AFCON final as the game
remained goalless after the extra time.
Goalkeeper Boubacar Barry
scored the last of the penalties to give the Elephants their second
title as they replaced Nigeria as African champions at the Estadio de
Bata after two previous attempts in the finals. The Elephants lost to
Egypt 4-2 on penalties in Egypt 2006 and also lost 8-7 to Zambia in the
2012 edition co-hosted by Equatorial Guinea and Gabon.
Ghana were
seeking their fifth title while the Ivorians were seeking their second.
The Elephants had defeated the Black Stars 11-10 in penalties to win
their first title in 1992 with African legend Abedi Pele Ayew as the
Ghanaian captain. On Sunday he had two of his children losing again to
the Ivorians. Abedi though missed that final clash after he got a second
yellow card in the semi final.
Elephants’ coach, Herve Renard,
also on Sunday became the first coach to win the trophy with two
different countries having done same with Zambia in 2012. Sunday night
was the 10th time the AFCON would be decided through penalty shoot outs.
The
finale was also the first time in the history of the tournament, two
families played in the AFCON final as the Toure brothers — Kolo and Yaya
— played against the Ayew brothers of Andre and Jordan. Ghana
captain Asamoah Gyan returned to the starting line-up in place of Jordan
Ayew after responding quickly to medical treatment to a hip injury. He
was hurt in a collision with Guinea goalkeeper Naby Yattara in the
quarterfinals and was only on the bench for his side’s semi-final. Ivory
Coast were without midfielder Cheick Tiote, who has yet to recover from
an ankle injury and veteran Barry replaced injured Sylvain Gbohouo in
goal.
The match between the two West African giants initially
didn’t measure up to the expected explosive encounter but improved
towards the latter part of the match. The Ghanaians neutralised
the efforts of the current African Footballer of the Year, Yaya Toure,
Wilfred Bony and Gervinho in the Ivorian attack while the attacking duo
of Gyan and Andre Ayew were also nullified by the Black Stars’ defence.
It
grew into an end to end affair but a moment of brilliance came from
Everton midfielder, Christian Atsu, in the 25th minute when he saw his
shot from 25 yards hit the upright. In the extra time, both sides
wasted chances after chances as the Ghanaians brought in Jordan Ayew and
this yielded more attack on the Ivorian defence while Renard brought in
Salomon Kalou as the game headed to for the dreaded penalty shootouts.
This article was adapted from IDRIS ADESINA, Punch Newspaper
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