Nigeria with a lot of players missing. Victor Osimehn (Napoli) our top striker is out as he has not recovered from a face injury Emmanuel Dennis (Watford) pulled out as he chose to help his club in relegation battle Etebo (Watford) key bench midfielder is injured. Ademola Lookman (Leicester) FIFA switch not completed in time Leon Balogun (Rangers) Our top CB is injured Kevin Akpoguma (Hoffenheim) CB not picked, rumors he turned invitation down because he was not playing under previous coach. Luckily we have a lot of depth and this is an opportunity for some other players who have not had much chance to get a look from the new coaching staff.
With all these absences I lean now a draw between Nigeria and Egypt in the Group D opener and Egypt to finish first eventually.
The big missing for me "Osimehn "and "Balogun" the other guys didn't participate in the WCQ , i think?. As you said maybe it will turn out good for you guys testing new potentially good players.
yeah those are the only 2 regular starters that are out. Balogun is getting old and we need to find a solid replacement any ways. Also Osimehn he is great but we depend too much on him lately. We need other options as backup.
Ghana will be missing Kudus Mohammed of Ajax. IMO he is their best player a massive miss. They also might be missing Jordan Ayew who just got injured playing for Crystal Palace yesterday. Ivory Coast's #1 keeper supposedly is suspended for doping. Also they are missing one of their main CB's Willy Boly of Wolves. Ismalia Sarr injured for Senegal, club doesn't want to release him but Senegal wants him for the later stages of the tournament.
I like that we'll see several big clashes from matchday 1. As head to head results are taken into consideration first and not goal differential there is almost no room for error. If you lose right away to your direct competition for topping the group then your odds of finishing first diminish very much. We got Cameroon - Burkina Faso, Morocco - Ghana, Nigeria - Egypt and Tunisia - Mali on the first matchday. These should be all good games to watch. I look forward the most to Group C. I think it's the most competitive group. Comoros are definately one of the better pot four sides. Morocco and Ghana are very close to each other in terms of overrall strengh. And Gabon is a side with some very good individuals upfront. They tend to play up against big teams and make life difficult for them. I predict that no team in that group will finish the group undefeated. Each team loses a game.
Mali are a side I expect to have a good tournament but not to go all the way. I'd classify also Morocco and Ghana into that category. These teams are all very talented and will do well but lack the maturity to win AFCON imo. However I'm bullish on Mali's chances to qualify for Qatar. I think more people will start to rate them after this AFCON.
We'll have one surprise quarterfinalist. A team that nobody expect to reach this stage. It may be not as big of a story like Madagascar 2019 but maybe more like Benin 2019 scraping through the group stage and upsetting some big team in the Round of 16. I'll reveal who that team I think will be together with my predictions for the entire tournament including all group stage games on Saturday. Feel free to share your in-depth predictions as well so we can compare.
Perhaps the most high profile friendly before the tournament Algeria has taken a 1-0 lead against ghana in the 7th minute through Adam Ounas (Napoli) Ghana is seriously understrength missing both Ayew brothers, Sulemana, Kudus Algeria full but missing Mahrez and Bennacer.
Yeah. Algeria with six starters. Ghana with three starters. I'm watching it. This understrengh Ghana team couldn't pose any problems to Algeria so far. Let's see how the 2nd half turns out.
Algeria are damn serious about defending their AFCON title. I see not many teams who could stop them in this tournament. Senegal, Morocco and Egypt. That's it. The rest won't stand much of a chance against them imo.
The final 3-0 scoreline flattered them a bit, and Ghana was extremely weakened squad. They did OK for the most part considering. I do think Algeria will be tough to stop but I dont think they will win again. We will see.
Yeah the scoreline was a bit too harsh. I didn't say Algeria will go back to back. But they are up there. They could do it. Will they do it? Remains to be seen...
Actually if I am going by who I think will win, I will say Algeria is the favorite to do a repeat. They look too strong and the Arab cup prep will really help them. If I am going to go by the unwritten rule of the "forgotten power" winning afcon, then I will have to say Ivory Coast or maybe Nigeria. Senegal is in between. Not THE favorite but also not a "forgotten power"
Also the North African teams rarely do well when they don't host the tournament. Algeria won in Egypt last time. Tunisia won at home in 2004, beating Morocco in the final. Only Egypts dynasty who won 3 straight afcons managed to win 2 titles in sub Saharan Africa. One was at home. Another factor to consider.
Egypt from 2006-2010 was the last team to defend their title. They marked a dynasty. I see the hunger and desire in this Algeria side to succeed and go on to repeat. The last reigning champions suffered all rather early exits. However for this Algeria I can say with confidence that it takes a very good performance by a big team to eliminate them. And I don't see many sides capable of that in Africa right now. Perhaps we should applaude Burkina Faso for having drawn them twice in WCQ. Shows how solid of a team "The Burkinabé" are. I'm being honest here. I can't see Ivory Coast nor Nigeria winning it. But that's me. The only Subsaharian side that is fully convincing me right now is Senegal. Nigeria got some serious absences to deal with and I don't like their coaching situation. Ivory Coast very good squad on paper but nowhere near as strong as in the years of Drogba & Touré. We haven't seen them firing on all cylinders. I see like why people would pick them but it's a huge gamble. I won't take it.
Yes exactly. Because of that I was rather pessimistic about North African teams. I had at some point no North African team in the semi-finals. Now I got one for sure. Might even go up to two which would be exceptional for a tournament hosted in Sub Saharian Africa. It just happens that North Africa is doing very well right now.
Algeria are now on a 34 games unbeaten run. As we all know now the Arab Cup games weren't taken into account. Algeria have surely set their sight on breaking Italy's record of 37 games. In that regard it was unfortunate that the Gambia friendly had to get called off due to COVID issues in the Gambia camp. It's plain and simple. Stay undefeated throughout the group stage and the Round of 16 and the new all-time world record is theirs. Without any disrespect to Sierra Leone and Equatorial Guinea these two will be a formality. It's only about Ivory Coast and a potential Round of 16 clash against Nigeria/Egypt. Ivory Coast gave them a hard time at last AFCON when they pushed it all the way to penalties. So Algeria will have to be wary. And if the Round of 16 is against Egypt that can get very tricky too. So the record is far from safe but I give them a very good chance to leave their mark in the history books.
I saw the highlights of Algeria's game against Ghana. None of the 3 goals should have happened at this level and, for Ghana's sake, I hope that is not their real keeper. The first goal was a soft shot to the goalies near post that any goalie should be able to easily save. The 2nd an own goal which (unlike some OGs which are unfortunate) the Ghana defender was at fault. The 3rd was also the fault of Ghana's keeper.
I think Ghana's starting goalkeeper will be from Swindon which is English fourth tier. Tells you that they are not blessed with talent at the goalkeeper position.
Aubameyang tested "positive". They started again guys and the governments use football as a scapegoat because is a very public sport and need to show the world the "virus" exist. I know some will say: "hey, you're crazy, conspirator" But in reality nobody has nothing after being tested positive. I know some people who were tested "positive" but most of them had absolutely nothing or some expected symptoms like headache etc which are normal when you have flu...I mean tell me at least one of these public faces who had something serious, nobody of course. It is exactly like about two years ago when they said that "apocalypse" is coming when the streets where empty. Two years later.... I'm still alive. People die because they are not eternal, its quite simple and die because of diseases caused by cola, junk food and other shits which governments allow to be sell in the supermarkets. This is not real... Now we have a popular case in Qatar when an Algerian player on his name M. Bennyetou was tested positive but he recovered his physical strength and scored in the last match leading to a complaint by the team he scored against, Al Arabi. He was even taken to the police station after the match.
After almost two years it's really no big news anymore if someone is tested positive. The headlines in the magazines and outlets are usually big but the player or coach says "guys I have few sympthoms, I'm allright and will be hopefully back very soon". And in more than 95% of the time they recover fast and return to action.... These COVID "side issues" are really making it tough to predict the tournament. If you're unlucky the team you support or predict to win gets an outbreak during the tournament it could change the outcome in some ways albeit they are allowed to call up a bigger squad of 28 players. We all wish that it won't be the case of course. For sportive reasons and also for health reasons.
The focus is not anymore on the game, it takes it all. A lot of players are missing games or the entire tournament because of nothing. As expected Aubameyang has no symptoms.