The Elephants of Ivory Coast fought hard to overcome Algeria and qualify for the semifinal of the 2015 African Nations Cup tournament, beating the Desert Foxes 3-1 to go through.
Billed as the clash of the tournament, it was Côte d'Ivoire who came out on top in the battle of the top two ranked teams in Africa.
For once, new Manchester City recruit, Wilfried Bony made the difference for his country, netting a brace that proved pivotal in the win.
To many people, Algeria were the favourites to win this championship, but they showed cracks right from the group stages.
Ivory Coast on their part, produced the performance of potential champions, churning out a good display to run out winners.
Bony netted the opening goal of the match, putting the Ivorians in front in the 25th minute.
Algeria pressed on for an equaliser, not just lining up to be beaten by Ivory Coast, but also putting up a fight.
Hilal Soudani drew the Algerians level in the 51st minute and the match was evenly poised for a showdown.
However Bony stepped up with the second goal in the 68th minute that once again gave his side the lead.
Gervinho on his return from suspension scored the decisive third goal which killed off any hopes of a comeback, puncturing all the forays of attacks from Algeria.
And Herve Renard's team secured the win as they matched into the semifinal where they will now face Congo DR.
IN ANOTHER MATCH GHANA BEAT GUINEA
Ghana's Black Stars on Sunday defeated Guinea to qualify for the semifinals of the 2015 African Nations Cup tournament.
It was a one-sided show from Avram Grant's team who had no difficulty dispatching their Guinean counterparts 3-0.
Guinea might have been lucky to have successfully emerged over Mali after lots were drawn on Thursday, but there was no escaping the defeat in the quarter-finals as they ended up losing.
Ghana got their noses in front early on in the match through Christain Atsu, who followed up Andre Ayew's back-heeled pass that eluded Asamaoh Gyan.
The Black Stars extended their lead after a mistake from Baissama Sankoh gifted Kwesi Appiah with an opportunity at goal, and the Cambridge player made no mistakes scoring the second goal.
Atsu scored a delectable third goal for Ghana, his second for the game, thereby killing off any hopes of a possible comeback.
Ghana saw out the game over an abject Guinea who looked a shadow of the team that played the group stages.
The semifinal qualification will be the fifth time in a row that Ghana will be making the last four, dating back to when they hosted the tournament in 2008.
Ghana will now face the hosts, Equatorial Guinea in the semifinal of the competition on Thursday.
No comments :
Post a Comment