By Aderonke Ojo
Hosts Atlas Lions of Morocco survived a Comoros gag to win the 2025 AFCON tournament opening match 2-0 after the Comoros guys deliberately frustrated every Moroccan move in the first half.
Brahim Diaz who was declared the man of the Match had earned a penalty but current African Footballer of the Year, Soufine Rahimi who plies his trade in UAE concentrating on looking at the ground not to give out his choice corner to put the ball played it straight into the Comoros Goalkeeper.
The heavens began to pour rain and in the 55th minute, Diaz got a thorough pass from over lapping defender, Moussair Mazraoui and tucked the ball neatly into the net for goal number one.
The 69,000 capacity stadium went frenzy in the 74th minute when a montage Bicycle goal was scored by Ayoub El Kaabi of Olympiacos FC from backing the goal post when he got a pass from Salah-Eddine. Already, Journalists are insisting that goal is surely the goal of the tournament.
Morocco dominated the match massively with 15-5 shots at goal on 7-2 shots on target; the North Africans had 71-29 ball possession with 5-0 corner kicks; they had 18-15 foul calls from which they had 3-1 yellow card bookings.
Morocco ranked 11th in the world and 1st in Africa had met Comoros four times winning three and drawing one. Both met on 13th October 2018 in AFCON match and Morocco won by a lone goal; on 16th October 2018 in the return leg, Morocco forced Comoros to 2-2 draw at their backyard; in another AFCON match of 14th January 2022 Morocco won 2-0 and at the FIFA Arab Nations cup this year played on the 2nd December Morocco won 3-1. Morocco qualified for AFCON five times in a row.
The Atlas Lions of Morocco has been to AFCON finals 20 times and only won in 1976 in Ethiopia beating Guinea. The country is the only Arab country to have reached the semifinal of the world cup under present Manager, Walid Regragui known in football community as BALD MAN because he is bald headed.
The Coelacanths of Comoros ranked 108 in the world and 19th in Africa is in their second finals appearance. They were beaten at the round of 16 games by Cameroon in 2021.
Group A second round games will feature Zambia versus Comoros on Friday 26th at 1830 hours while same day but at 2100 hours hosts Morocco will test the might of the Eagles of Mali. Last group games will be played simultaneously at 8 pm when Zambia will face Morocco and Comoros will trade tackles with Mali.
Tomorrow Monday 22nd December, three matches will be played when Mali will meet Zambia at 1500 hours; South Africa will face Angola at 6pm and Egypt will file out against Zimbabwe.
The Super Eagles of Nigeria are in Fez to take on old foe Taifa Stars of Tanzania on Tuesday at 6:30pm.
Meanwhile Uganda Crane players on Saturday boycotted training over unpaid allowances and match bonuses accruing to them for over a year and the strike moved by senior players of the team disrupted training schedule of the country.
Uganda FA officials had to meet with the players till the early hours of Sunday and the boys went back for training Sunday evening to prepare for their match against Tunisia on Tuesday.