In March 1980, I sat in the Commentary Box of the National Stadium when Nigeria’s Central Defender, Godwin Odiye made a faulty back header to Nigeria’s Man Mountain legendary goalkeeper Emmanuel Oguejiofor Okalla which gave Algeria the ticket to the world cup and Nigeria’s ace Commentator, Earnest Okonkwo of Blessed memory exclaimed, “Nigeria has scored Nigeria. Oh Nigeria has stopped Nigeria from going to the world cup”.
Africa on Thursday at the Stade de la Beaujoire, Nantes through Morocco stopped Africa, Egypt from winning the Bronze medal in a dented way, 6-0 before Ref Espen Eskas of Norway.
Morocco white washed Egypt 6-0 to hang the Bronze medals on their necks with a braze from Soufiane Rahimi in the 26th and 64th minutes, maintaining the highest tournament scorer with 8 goals but it was Ezzalzouli that opened scoring for Morocco in the 23rd minute. First half ended 2-0 in favor of the Atlas Lions.
On resumption of the highly one sided game, El Khannous scored the 3rd goal for Morocco in the 51st minute. Soufiane Rahimi again provided the assist for Akram Nakach to score the 5th goal in the 73rd minute and Skipper Achraf Hakimi scored the 6th goal to complete the routing of the Egyptians.
A total of 88 goals were scored in 31 matches of the Men’s tournament after the Bronze Match with total 750,310 attendances (24,204 per match).
Morocco dominated the game with 7-3 shots on target; 6-3 corner kicks and the Moroccan Goalkeeper had 3-1 saves. Egypt were better ball holders with 51-49% ball possession; were caught offside once without Morocco being offside; had 11-13 foul calls and 2-1 yellow cards.
The battle for Bronze at the Paris Olympics was purely a North African affair and a reenactment of the 2023 AFCON U23 final when Morocco had beaten Egypt 2-1 after Extra Time on 8th July 2023. Egypt had piped Guinea by a lone goal in the semifinal.
To get into the battle for the Bronze, Egypt had beaten Spain 2-1; lost to Uzbekistan by a lone goal and played goalless with Dominican Republic in group C. The Pharaohs clipped the Paraguayans 5-4 on penalty kicks in the quarterfinal after 1-1 before bowing to Les Bleus of France tutored by the Igwe (king of British Football), Thierry Henri 1-3 in the semifinals. She played two warm up marches against Ivory Coast before the Olympics, first on 7th June 2024 won by a lone goal and then on 11th June 2024 won by Egypt 2-1.
She was at the Tokyo Olympics where she lost by a lone goal to the Samba Boys of Brazil in the quarterfinals. Her Group C records in Tokyo were impressive – beat Australia 2-0; lost 0-1 to the dreaded Argentine team and played goalless with the mighty Spanish team.
Egypt has 13 appearances at the Olympics and lost the Bronze twice, in the Netherlands 1928 tournament losing to Italy by a whopping 3-11 at the Amsterdam as if it was a Basketball match before a crowd of 6,378 fans in the match handled by Ref Jan Lange Nus of Belgium and also lost the Bronze at Japan 1964 when the United team of Germany handed the Egyptians 3-1 beating before a mammoth crowd of 65,610 fans at Tokyo before Ref Yokoyana of Japan.
The Atlas Lions of Morocco had in Group B at the Paris Olympics drowned the Iraqi squad 3-0; lost to the war torn Ukraine team 1-2 and slammed the Lionel Messi boys of Argentina 2-1. She showed the way back to America for the Yankee Boys with a wonderful 4-0 bashing in the quarters but Spain came from behind to win the semifinal 2-1. She had played 2-2 with Belgium and lost to Ukraine by a lone goal in her preparation for the Paris Olympics.
In the AFCON U23 tournament, she hatched Congo by a lone goal; walloped Ghana 5-1 and beat Guinea 2-1 in Group A. The semifinal was tough as she could only overcome the Young Stallions of Mali 4-3 on penalties after 2-2 at full time before lifting the title 2-1 against Egypt.
Morocco, whose senior team went far at the last world cup, won the AFCON title in 2023 and was Runners-up in 2011 Gabon beat the team in the final 2-1 after the same Morocco had beaten the Pharaohs 3-2 in the semifinal.
The final ranking is Morocco 3rd; Egypt 4th; Japan 5th; Paraguay 6th; Argentina 7th; United States 8th; Ukraine 9th; Iraq 10th; New Zealand 11th; Dominican Republic 12th; Uzbekistan 13th; Mali 14th; Israel 15th and Guinea 16th.
The Finals of the Men’s Paris Olympics 2024 will be played tomorrow Friday between hosts France and Spain at the Parc des Princes, Paris with Ref Ramon Abati of Brazil (no relationship with Nigerian Journalism icon and former Presidential Media Aide, Dr. Reuben Abati) in charge
The Nigerian U23 Team did not qualify for the Olympics Games final but the Nigerian women were sent home after the group games without a victory.
