ACTUALITE |
14.06.2006
Togo Prolongs Africa’s Agony
Like Ghana, Angola and Côte d’Ivoire, Togo lost their first group matches yesterday
The surprise was expected to come from Togo. But bookmakers, who rated all African debutants at the 18th World Cup underway in Germany as outsiders, were once more proven right. Despite an impressive first half crowned with a 1-0 lead over South Korea, the Hawks of Togo finally fell to the Taeguk Warriors of South Korea, 1 — 2, in their Group G clash at Frankfurt`s Commerzbank Arena. The defeat of Togo was a culmination of bad results that have been registered by African teams since the start of the competition. Last Saturday, Côte d’Ivoire fell to Argentina 1— 2, on Sunday Angola stumbled to Portugal 0-1, while Italy humiliated Ghana 2 — 0 on Monday. Africa’s hope for at least one victory in the first group matches now resides in Tunisia which takes on Spain at 8:00 pm in Stuttgart today.
A victory for Togo would have been one of the greatest surprises of the tournament. In effect, Togo`s preparations for their first World Cup have been marred by several shameful incidents which culminated with coach Otto Pfister resigning last Friday over a squad pay row before making a U-turn on Monday. Confusion continued inside the stadium yesterday when the Korean anthem was played twice before the Togolese national anthem.
Yesterday’s match started off slowly for both sides as the players struggled to adapt to the high temperatures (over 30°C) beneath a closed roof. Fans of both teams, dressed in their national colours, were however at their best as they cheered their heroes unceasingly. The deadlock was broken at the 31st minute when Mohamed Kader Coubadja sprinted forward, controlled the ball beautifully with his thigh and shot low into the bottom corner of the net. The goal destabilised the Korean side which fought in vain to equalise before half time.
On resumption, Togo continued to press on. But, things went sour at the 53rd minute when captain Jean-Paul Abalo was shown a red card for bringing down Park Ji-sung on the edge of the goal area. Lee Chun-soo materialised the resulting free kick into a goal. With Togo reduced to 10 men, Korean substitute, Ahn Jung-hwan, could easily rifle home the winner in the 72nd minute. All efforts by Togo to equalise proved futile as South Korea`s one-man advantage worked to their favour.
The defeat notwithstanding, Togo’s coach, Otto Pfister, was proud of his side`s World Cup debut. "When you get a red card, then it becomes hard. Overall we played a good match in a 10 versus 11 situation", he said. South Korean coach, Dick Advocaat, on the other hand praised his boys for keeping cool and coming from behind to beat Togo. "It is so important to win your first game because it normally means you stay in the tournament for the second round," he noted.
The second matches of the African debutants will be very crucial. Togo would face Switzerland on June 19th and France on June 23rd in their last two group matches. One more defeat will be enough to end their world cup dreams. Meanwhile, Tunisia enters the scene today with a match against Saudi Arabia in Munich.
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