History may be the best cover letter for Cameroon, but also too heavy a backpack. With a squad without any bright figures and a coach who took charge just over seven months ago, Africa’s most capped national team at the World Cup will try it out in Qatar he cut a run of five appearances in which they failed to get past the group stage. It won’t be an easy mission, given that, a priori, he will be the stone guest in group G which will also include Brazil, Switzerland and Serbia.
The DT: Rigobert Song, an emblem come to put out the fire
Changing driver four weeks before the two games that will define the ticket to a World Cup doesn’t seem like the best idea, but the bench of the Cameroon national team has never been the most stable place for a coach. At the end of February, the Portuguese Antonio Conceicao He was sacked days after taking third place in the Africa Cup of Nations and after a dispute between the Cameroonian Football Federation (FCF), led by the former goalscorer since November Samuel Eto’oand the Ministry of Sports which agreed with the decision of the president of the nation, Paul Bia.
For a position held by 13 men over the last two decades (most of them Europeans), the man chosen was an emblem of Cameroonian football: Rigoberto Song. The 46-year-old former central scorer is the player who has played the most games in the history of Juventus indomitable lions (137) and is one of three African footballers who have participated in four World Cups (the others are his compatriots Eto’o and Jacques Songo’o): he did so in the United States 1994, France 1998, South Korea-Japan 2002 and South Africa 2010. He was also Africa Cup of Nations champion in Ghana-Nigeria 2000 and Mali 2002.
“We made a promise to nationalize the national team and we kept it”, Eto’o boasted after the appointment, announced on 28 February. However, not everyone welcomed it with optimism. Questions focused on Song’s inexperience as a helmsman. In 2018 he had managed a team made up of footballers from the local league and in 2019 he had been in charge of the Under 23 team that had participated in the Africa Cup of Nations in that category which was held in Egypt and in which the Cameroonians failed to pass the group stage. Since then he no longer had a job.
As (almost) always in football, results dominate. World Cup qualificationwhich his team achieved at the end of March by beating Algeria as hosts in the last round of African qualifying thanks to a goal in the added fourth minute of extra time converted by Karl Toko Ekambi, was recognition for Song, even if not it has come about that this football hero of his country has completely erased any doubts about his abilities.
None of this has pierced the former defender’s confidence. “Cameroon is still Cameroon and we are determined to show that we did not qualify for the World Cup by accident.. We have a good group where experienced players join the younger ones ”, she highlighted. And he raised the bar much higher than what almost everyone thinks is achievable for his team: “The president of the Federation made me understand that we have to be in the quarterfinals, so our goal is to go further and reach the semifinals” .
Figure: Vincent Aboubakar, the captain of experience
The times when Samuel Eto’o shone in Barcelona and even aspired to win a Ballon d’Or are long gone. Cameroon today does not have a footballer of those carats in its ranksThough most of his squad serves in Europe and some do so in elite squads such as goalkeeper André Onana (Inter) and central midfielder André Zambo Anguissa (Napoli). Already far from Old Worldthe man who continues to hold up the hopes of indomitable lions he is an experienced captain vincent aboubakar.
Although he has been playing for Saudi Al-Nassr since the middle of last year, where he is a teammate Gonzalo compassion Martinez, the centre-forward has played for more than a decade in European football. At the age of 18 he began his journey in the French Valenciennes, where adaptation was very difficult for him (“It was hard because I arrived in a totally strange country, having no idea about anything”counted), but then settled in Lorient and made good strides through Porto and Besiktas before embarking on a journey to the Middle East.
He was also 18 when he wore the shirt of his country’s national team for the first time: it was on 29 May 2010 in a friendly match against Slovakia in Klagenfurt (Austria). Just two weeks later, he played his first World Cup, in South Africa, supported by the confidence of French coach Paul Le Guen. In 2014 he repeated the experience in Brazil. In neither edition was he able to score a goal or celebrate a victory.
On the other, the striker who admires Ronaldinho (“he’s the player who inspired me the most”, he assured) and Cristiano Ronaldo (he underlined “his elite mentality”). he was the author of the goal that gave his team the 2-1 in the final of the African Cup against Egypt in 2017 in Libreville (Gabon). And he was the top scorer in the edition of the continental tournament that was played this year (he scored eight goals).
At 30 and with 88 caps for the national team (in which he scored 33 goals), Aboubakar will seek revenge in a World Cup. “We are in a difficult group, against teams of the caliber of Brazil, Switzerland and Serbia,” he warned. But he was confident: “We have to arrive at the World Cup in the best shape possible, hopefully without injuries, and prepare well. From there, we’ll see what happens. We have a good team, capable and with an excellent mentality”.
The team: Africa’s most capped team at the World Cup
For a continent constantly represented at the World Cup since 1970 (apart from the isolated participation of Egypt in Italy 1934), Cameroon has become the flagship, as they make their eighth appearance in this class of competition in Qatarmore than all its neighbors (it is followed by Nigeria, which has given the present in six World Cups, but will miss this one).
The premiere was in Spain in 1982 and his interpretation was amazing. Three draws in a very complicated group, which they shared with Peru, Poland and Italy left the indomitable lions at the gates of the passage to the round of 16: he remained out for having scored one goal less than the Azzurriwho would later end up retaining the title.
If participation in Spain was positive, even more exceptional was the passage through Italy in 1990. The Cameroonians surprised Argentina on their debut in Milan, won their group, beat Colombia in the round of 16 and capitulated in extra time against England in the quarter-finals. They were the first representatives of their continent to reach that instance. Plus the goals and dances of Roger Milla They became indelible images of that competition.
Since then, everything has gone downhill. In the next five appearances, the Africans failed to progress from the group stage, winning just one game in 15 (1-0 against Saudi Arabia in South Korea-Japan 2002) and losing the last seven games. To make matters worse, his latest record in Brazil 2014 included brawls between some team members and suspicions that some footballers had been involved in maneuvers to manipulate results (one of them, Alexandre Song, nephew of the current coach).
Among the many setbacks of recent years, at least one man has written his name in the football history books. With the goal scored in the 6-1 defeat against Russia at Stanford, in the last round B match in the USA in 1994, Roger Milla became the longest-serving footballer to score in a World Cup: he did so with 42 years and 39 days.
Source: Clarin
