ZoltaR
20 Jan 2006, 06:01 PM
CAN 2006: Let the games begin
The huge festival of African football gets started in Egypt this Friday. More hotly contested than ever, the competition promises to be spectacular and there are five Olympians in action. Find out more...
http://s.om.net/om/image/article/illustration/8/1528.jpg
Almost 20 days of competition, 16 national teams will go head to head to become, on the evening of February 10, the successor to Roger Lemerre’s Tunisia, the 2004 winners. Often criticised by Europe for its organisation in the middle of the season, the CAN remains one of the world’s biggest footballing events. Especially in France, where Ligue 1 alone, will furnish no less than 72 players, as indicated the daily sports paper l'Equipe on Thursday. Among them, the five Olympians are Mamadou Niang and Habib Beye for Senegal, Taye Taiwo and Wilson Oruma for Nigeria and finally Abdou Méité for the Ivory Coast. The draw even decided that the Senegalese and the Nigerians would be in the same group. (CFull draw below).
The tournament is full of class, starting with the five African nationas that are qualified for the World Cup in Germany later this year: The Ivory Coast Elephants, Togo’s Epervier, the Palancas Negras of Angola, Ghana’s Black Cats and the Eagles of Carthage, Tunisia. These teams may be the favourites, but beware the outsiders warned OM President Pape Diouf, with his special eye on African football. With the involvement of so many European-based players we can imagine the favourites will appear in all the predictions, teams like the Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Senegal and the northern Arab countries, and in my opinion a team like Egypt, playing at home, will be very hard to beat. The winner will certainly come from one of these teams. I don’t think there’ll be any surprise, even though a team like Togo has qualified for the World Cup,” claimed the Olympian president, who hails from Senegal.
Created in 1957 the competition is as popular as ever in Africa. An atmosphere only heightened by the presence of stars from some of the world’s biggest clubs, such as Didier Drogba, Samuel Eto’o, Obafemi Martins or even Emmanuel Adebayor. Kick-off is this Friday at 18:00 when Egypt take on Libya in Cairo.
Olympians Watch
Group A: IVORY COAST
January 21: Marocco – Ivory Coast 14:00 (Cairo)
January 24: Libya – Ivory Coast 17:15 (Cairo)
January 28: Egypte – Ivory Coast 19:00 (Cairo)
Group D: SENEGAL
January 23: Zimbabwe - Senegal 20:00 (Port Saïd)
January 27: Ghana - Senegal 17:15 (Port-Saïd)
January 31: Nigeria - Senegal 19:00 (Port-Saïd)
Group D: NIGERIA
January 23: Nigeria - Ghana 17:15 (Port-Saïd)
January 27: Nigeria - Zimbabwe 20:00 (Port-Saïd)
January 31: Nigeria - Senegal 19:00 (Port-Saïd)
Quarter-finals, February 3and 4
Semi-finals, February 7
Third-place play-off, February 9
Final, February 10 in Cairo
Follow the matches on Europort, TV5 or Canal Horizons
http://s.om.net/om/file/200601/220_beye.jpg
Beye: “Our goal is to win”
Just a few days before the start of competition, Habib Beye, the Senegal and Marseille defender talked about his countries ambitions in the African Cup of Nations.
What are Senegal’s hopes for this CAN?
Senegal is here to win. Senegal has never won and has only made one final, lost on penalties, so we badly want to win this CAN to take the trophy back to our people.
Today’s Senegal team is very experienced…
The current generation of players is ready to move on because we’ve already played in two CANs and a World Cup. It will get some new blood and evolve. If we don’t win now, it will be tough for this generation to win it again.
You’ll be playing against your teammates from Nigeria, Taiwo and Oruma, who are in your group. How will that go?
There’s a chance I’ll be right-back and Taiwo left-back. It will be a great battle. What would be good is for Nigeria to be eliminated quickly so that OM can get two players back!
The huge festival of African football gets started in Egypt this Friday. More hotly contested than ever, the competition promises to be spectacular and there are five Olympians in action. Find out more...
http://s.om.net/om/image/article/illustration/8/1528.jpg
Almost 20 days of competition, 16 national teams will go head to head to become, on the evening of February 10, the successor to Roger Lemerre’s Tunisia, the 2004 winners. Often criticised by Europe for its organisation in the middle of the season, the CAN remains one of the world’s biggest footballing events. Especially in France, where Ligue 1 alone, will furnish no less than 72 players, as indicated the daily sports paper l'Equipe on Thursday. Among them, the five Olympians are Mamadou Niang and Habib Beye for Senegal, Taye Taiwo and Wilson Oruma for Nigeria and finally Abdou Méité for the Ivory Coast. The draw even decided that the Senegalese and the Nigerians would be in the same group. (CFull draw below).
The tournament is full of class, starting with the five African nationas that are qualified for the World Cup in Germany later this year: The Ivory Coast Elephants, Togo’s Epervier, the Palancas Negras of Angola, Ghana’s Black Cats and the Eagles of Carthage, Tunisia. These teams may be the favourites, but beware the outsiders warned OM President Pape Diouf, with his special eye on African football. With the involvement of so many European-based players we can imagine the favourites will appear in all the predictions, teams like the Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Senegal and the northern Arab countries, and in my opinion a team like Egypt, playing at home, will be very hard to beat. The winner will certainly come from one of these teams. I don’t think there’ll be any surprise, even though a team like Togo has qualified for the World Cup,” claimed the Olympian president, who hails from Senegal.
Created in 1957 the competition is as popular as ever in Africa. An atmosphere only heightened by the presence of stars from some of the world’s biggest clubs, such as Didier Drogba, Samuel Eto’o, Obafemi Martins or even Emmanuel Adebayor. Kick-off is this Friday at 18:00 when Egypt take on Libya in Cairo.
Olympians Watch
Group A: IVORY COAST
January 21: Marocco – Ivory Coast 14:00 (Cairo)
January 24: Libya – Ivory Coast 17:15 (Cairo)
January 28: Egypte – Ivory Coast 19:00 (Cairo)
Group D: SENEGAL
January 23: Zimbabwe - Senegal 20:00 (Port Saïd)
January 27: Ghana - Senegal 17:15 (Port-Saïd)
January 31: Nigeria - Senegal 19:00 (Port-Saïd)
Group D: NIGERIA
January 23: Nigeria - Ghana 17:15 (Port-Saïd)
January 27: Nigeria - Zimbabwe 20:00 (Port-Saïd)
January 31: Nigeria - Senegal 19:00 (Port-Saïd)
Quarter-finals, February 3and 4
Semi-finals, February 7
Third-place play-off, February 9
Final, February 10 in Cairo
Follow the matches on Europort, TV5 or Canal Horizons
http://s.om.net/om/file/200601/220_beye.jpg
Beye: “Our goal is to win”
Just a few days before the start of competition, Habib Beye, the Senegal and Marseille defender talked about his countries ambitions in the African Cup of Nations.
What are Senegal’s hopes for this CAN?
Senegal is here to win. Senegal has never won and has only made one final, lost on penalties, so we badly want to win this CAN to take the trophy back to our people.
Today’s Senegal team is very experienced…
The current generation of players is ready to move on because we’ve already played in two CANs and a World Cup. It will get some new blood and evolve. If we don’t win now, it will be tough for this generation to win it again.
You’ll be playing against your teammates from Nigeria, Taiwo and Oruma, who are in your group. How will that go?
There’s a chance I’ll be right-back and Taiwo left-back. It will be a great battle. What would be good is for Nigeria to be eliminated quickly so that OM can get two players back!