African Cup of Nations

[thischarmingman]

Anyone else looking forward to this? Less than a month to go...

Group A
1. ANGOLA
2. MALI
3. MALAWI
4. ALGERIA

Group B
1. COTE D'IVOIRE
2. BURKINA FASO
3. GHANA
4. TOGO

Group C
1. EGYPT
2. NIGERIA
3. MOZAMBIQUE
4. BENIN

Group D
1. CAMEROON
2. GABON
3. ZAMBIA
4. TUNISIA

http://www.cafonline.com/competition/african-cup-of-nations-angola_2010/results

[Acornvilla]

cant wait! as usual i'm going for the ivory coast 3rd time lucky :)

[culloty82]

Eurosport usually shows all the matches, and they're usually end-to-end exciting games with plenty goals. Nigeria and Ghana can't be discounted, but I expect two of Cameroon, Egypt and Ivory Coast to make the final, with Eto'o picking up another winners medal.

[Acornvilla]

Eurosport usually shows all the matches, and they're usually end-to-end exciting games with plenty goals. Nigeria and Ghana can't be discounted, but I expect two of Cameroon, Egypt and Ivory Coast to make the final, with Eto'o picking up another winners medal.

muntari and appiah wont be in ghana squad.. thats them out of the running anyway in my opinion

[superfrank]

Excited about this one. C'mon Malawi, Gabon and Mozambique!

I reckon it'll be Egypt, Algeria or Cameroon. Angola could have an outside chance as hosts.

[gustavo]

Go on Benin!

[CF1989]

benin will win it. must be the only country to have their King playing.

[bennocelt]

Will BBC be showing any live games, since they are involved with the African footballer of the year, etc?
Looking forward to this..............

[superfrank]

Last time around, they showed most of the games on BBC 3 or 4 and they showed the final on BBC 2. I imagine they'll do something similar this year.

[thischarmingman]

Definitely on Eurosport (http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/09122009/58/international-football-african-cup-nations-2010-live-eurosport.html)but BBC is unconfirmed at the moment (I'm guessing, due to lack of any mention of coverage anywhere on their site of elsewhere online).

[brianw82]

Definitely on Eurosport (http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/09122009/58/international-football-african-cup-nations-2010-live-eurosport.html)but BBC is unconfirmed at the moment (I'm guessing, due to lack of any mention of coverage anywhere on their site of elsewhere online).

They were advertising all the football in January over the past few days and there was definitely no mention of the ACN. :(

[RoversInn]

Benin to win!

[thischarmingman]

They were advertising all the football in January over the past few days and there was definitely no mention of the ACN. :(

Yeah, it would be being heavily promoted now. Eurosport and online feeds it is then.

[lionelhutz]

When is this kicking off?

[old git]

When is this kicking off?

starts 10th january untill 31st january

http://www.cafonline.com/userfiles/file/press-releases/new_eng_orange2010fixturespdfpdf-126129041.pdf

[Cymro]

Ivory Coast have to be favourites with Drogba, not that the other African teams don't have good players too but I'd back them to win the tournament on balance. It will also be interesting to see how it affects the premiership title race.

[Acornvilla]

Ivory Coast have to be favourites with Drogba, not that the other African teams don't have good players too but I'd back them to win the tournament on balance. It will also be interesting to see how it affects the premiership title race.
ah if it isnt himself :)
yep should be intrestin.
pompey are screwd now thou...
Ivory coast big favourats in my eyes they have a very strong squad all they realy lack is a quality goalkeeper

[Ceirtlis]

Team news bad for Egypt(missing Abou Treika, Zaki and Mido) and Ghana(Mensah, Muntari, Appiah, Paintsil). Nigeria struggled through qualifying for the WC(doubled as qualifying for this) and there is alot of pressure on their manager.

Looks to be between Ivory Coast and Cameroon alright. If I was backing outright I would go with Cameroon as IC are no value at 5/2 for the tournament. There are 4 stages to get through.

Anyone seen any of the other teams? Algeria are being mentioned as dark horses and have a good defence which I think is a plus in knock out tournaments.

It is 4.90 to subscribe to eurosport player for the month. Well worth it I think, saves hastle in trying to get a pirate stream.

[HarpoJoyce]

Bluffers guide from the BBC
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/piersedwards/2010/01/ivorian_elephants_lead_the_cha.html


Angolan Press Agency
http://www.portalangop.co.ao/motix/en_us/noticias/desporto/index.html

Official CAN2010 website
http://www.can-angola2010.com/index.htm?Language=en_EN

After Edit; Official Site link that works atm
http://www.can-angola2010.com/index.htm

[bennocelt]

Did my bets for this today (with PP)

Reckon it will be Ivory Coast and Ghana in the final. Ghana have an awesome midfield (as well as Mali), and Drogba will surely help IC to the final
Little value in these bets though - with IC 9/4 to win and 10/11 to get to the final, and Ghana 9/4 to reach the final
But did see that Drogba to be top scorer and IC to win was a very good 11/1 (a value bet), even though Eto and kanoute would be the danger for top scorers
Did mali at 5/2 to win their group, and Nigeria at evens

[Boo_Boy]

Crazy what happened today. Togo likely to pull out now.

Plan on backing Ivory Coast/Cameroon as the finalists @ 8/1

[Infadel]

I've no idea why the AFC would choose a country in a region of instability to host African Cup Of Nations. It could have been avoided....

[HarpoJoyce]

I havn't the name of the driver yet but the two players injured are reported by ESPN to be "GSI Pontivy [France] goalkeeper Kodjovi Obilalé and Vaslui FC [Romania] defender Serge Akakpo.
http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=722453&sec=global&campaign=rss&source=soccernet&cc=5739

BBC update: a quote from CAN organisers as saying "Competition officials said they had not known that the Togolose team had decided to drive directly to Cabinda.

They said they had expected the squad first to fly to the Angolan capital, Luanda, and from there to Cabinda. "

The team had police escort so some local organisations knew they were making this trip. National teams reluctance to use reliable aircraft jepardises more individual players. (I'm thinking of the Zambia teams air crash in the 1990's and previous of Nat. Teams uses military aircraft that were not vetted by the destination country.)

Cabinda area was always going to be a sensitive place as it's an Angolan enclave between Dem. Rep. Congo (Kinshasa) and Rep. of Congo (Brazzaville) the country where the team had being training as preparation and had just exited. There has been a long-running armed separist movement there (FLEC), peace broke out only recently (2006) and agreements since then have kept alot of oil-money within Cabinda.

All the reports I've read so far mentioned Emmanuel Adebayor no quotes from him, but some mention the Manchester City website.

[Ceirtlis]

I would have my doubts the competition will go ahead after this.

[jebus]

hadn't realised the extent of what happened, taken down on my part, could you edit yours as well?

[stojkovic]

I wonder has Delaney asked can we replace Togo if they pull out ?

[culloty82]

The latest this morning is that the competition is likely to go ahead, but with the Cabinda matches re-arranged for other venues. Strangely, no-one expects Togo to pull out, which would have been understandable after yesterday.

[De Town]

Togo have pulled out of the competition now.

[thischarmingman]

As above:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/africa/8449611.stm

[Closed Account 2]

Yeah Cabina is a very unsafe part of Angola, geographically it's isolated from the rest of the country and all of the websites (foreign office, us state dept, etc) warn of travelling there.

It's tragic news and the senseless nature of the violence (it's basically youths just shooting at anything) is one of the most depressing aspect of it.

[paudie]

Hadn't realised there was a seperatist movement in part of Angola.

hopefully there will be no matches played in that region.

Saw a rumour on Aertel that the Togo reserve keeper had died after the attack.

[Closed Account 2]

Think he's been flown to Joburg for surgery and is in a serious condition - that's the case with one of the keepers anyway. Sadly there are a lot of guns and mines in the country. People forget the scale of the conflict in the late 80s, with thousands of Cuban and South African troops involved, most of the equipment was just left there in the hands of UNITA and MPLA.

[Rovers1]

Anyone know if the games are being streamed online?

[superfrank]

There's plenty up on Myp2p already.

On the coverage, saw this (http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/africa/8450491.stm) bit on the BBC:

Venue and dates: Angola, 10-31 January Coverage: Final and semi-finals live on BBC TV, BBC World Service and commentaries on BBC Sport website. Live commentary on opening match on BBC World Service and BBC Sport website

[twoenz]

Just watching the opening match on Eurosport at the minute. Two nil to the hosts against Mali. The Malian goalkeeper may as well be watching the match in my living room. He's awful.

[ifk101]

Yeah he's dodgy alright - looks quite small as well, no real presence about him.

Mali as a team are all over the place though, no real game-plan and lots of individual errors. Angola are keeping it simple and doing that well.

[Schumi]

The Angola defence doesn't look so great now either! Nice finish from Kanoute.

[twoenz]

What a comeback!!!!

[Schumi]

Unbelievable 4-4. :eek:

[Boo_Boy]

I can't believe what I just watched.

What a game.

[ifk101]

That was mad. :D

Yeah that was some header by Kanoute.

[Acornvilla]

i stoped watching after 65 mins when it was 2-0 :(

[cartman]

the most incredible game i've ever seen.. 4 down with 10
mins left, still 3 down with 3 mins left...

hillarious stuff :-)

imagine what mali could do if they put in any effort at all.. brilliant

[Boo_Boy]

I said to myself at 4-1 should I put a quid on a Mali comeback.

Feck it.

[elroy]

African football has a tendancy to be a bit random like this......hmmm maybe its just the sceptic in me but I wonder if there are any betting iregularities etc.

[TheBoss]

African football has a tendancy to be a bit random like this......hmmm maybe its just the sceptic in me but I wonder if there are any betting iregularities etc.

First thing that came into my head, mad game.

[theworm2345]

Watched the whole game, great start to the tournament :)

[shakermaker1982]

I stopped watching at 4 nil.

I flicked back and the commentator sounded like he had just had an hour with Scarlett Johansson.... ****ing not happy.

[Boo_Boy]

About 100 people at the game today in the same stadium which was packed last night. Such a shame.

[twoenz]

Sparse crowd and even more goalkeeping nightmares today.

Russel for Malawi looks a tidy player.