Elephants to maintain status quo against Desert Hawks

 

Away from the impressive opening ceremony and the opening matches, the action shifts to Malabo, the capital city of Equatorial Guinea for the Group B matches.

In the first match of the group, favourites Cote d’Ivoire will be up against Sudan in an encounter that favours the latter. The star-studded Elephants are highly tipped to scoop the maximum points at the expense of the Desert Hawks, who are the torchbearers of the CECAFA zone.

The Ivorians have the upperhand over their opponents, who are the only team at the tournament parading an entire locally-based set of players. The failure of the Elephants to scoop the maximum will go into the books as one of the shockers of the tournament taking into consideration that their players are more exposed and experienced than their Sudanese counterparts.

Elephants’ captain Didier Drogba and the likes of Didier Zokora, Salomon Kalou, Yao Kouassi Gervais “Gervinho,” the Toure brothers; Kolo and Yaya are very much aware that there can be no better time to lay their hands on the Holy Grail of African football and the journey must start with the clipping of the wings of the Desert Hawks.

The fact that the Sudanese have never beaten the Ivorians at the finals of the Africa Cup of Nations is another factor that favours that Elephants as far as the maximum points are concerned. Their only meeting was at the 1970 edition, which the Ivorians won by a lone goal but the Sudanese went on to win the title on home soil.

Sudan had a modest preparation towards but the worrying factor is that they failed to score in test matches in the build up to the tournament. Coach Mohamed ‘Mazda’ Abdallah has a lot of confidence in his players despite their lack of international exposure.

Striker Mudathir Eltaib ‘Careca’ is expected to make a return to the squad after a long lay-off that kept him out of action for the latter stages of the qualifying series. The Sudanese are still being haunted by their goal-shy performance at their last appearance in 2008 in Ghana, but an optimistic Abdallah believes they will get better this term.

“Football is a game of surprises and I am confident of reaching the knockout stage. Anything can happen at the Africa Cup of Nations and nobody can predict what will happen next,” Abdallah noted.

For Francois Zahoui, he is counting on the collective effort of his team rather than the reliance of some players.

“I want to rely on all the players and not just an individual. We cannot rely on our big names,” Zahoui said.