Posts Tagged ‘Wilfried Bony’

SMS’s European-based African Team of the 2012-2013 Season

Posted: June 5, 2013 by Salim Masoud Said in African Football
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Salim Masoud Said cherry-picks some of the outstanding African players in Europe this season. To the business at hand:

Goalkeeper: Kossi Agassa (Stade Reims/Togo)

The Togolese goalkeeper has endured a tumultuous international career that has been consistently simmering for the last 7 years, but has had another very good season with storied Stade Reims at club level, reaffirming the belief that he is arguably the best goalkeeper Africa has to offer. ‘Magic Hands’ has been the undisputed number 1 with the newly promoted side, transmitting Kossiness to a defence that, conceding just 42 goals and finishing as the 7th meanest defence, has been economical enough to survive at the first time of asking despite being frugal in front of goal.

Right-back: Emmanuel Eboue (Galatasaray/Cote d’Ivoire)

It’s now two consecutive Turkish Super League titles for the alacrity-filled right-back. The defensive frailties still remain, as does the whimsicality which has made him one of the most loved players in the game, but his five assists from right-back portray that the sojourns into opposition territory are becoming increasingly fruitful. The right-back has been ushered to the periphery at international level after an indifferent Afcon and speaking out against the Ivorian FA, but on current form he will be difficult to ignore.

Centre-back: Nicholas Nkoulou (Marseille/Cameroon)

In a Marseille side that has bored opponents and everyone into submission, Nkoulou has unquestionably been their most aesthetically pleasing player – and their best. Nkoulou stands at a mere 5’10”, but who needs height when you can read the game so magnificently, as if rereading your favourite book for the umpteenth time. He has formed a formidable centre-back partnership with Lucas Mendes that saw them go almost 2 months without conceding. It’s easier to defend when you’re scoring so many, but to score only 42 goals and concede 35 – meaning having to be under the duress of squeaky-time almost on a weekly basis – and automatically qualify for the Champions League is an incredible achievement.

Centre-back: Joseph Yobo (Fenerbahce/Nigeria)

The uncompromising defender continues to cement his place as one of Africa’s most consistent defensive exports of recent times. The maths does all the talking: Fenerbahce conceded 19 goals in 20 games with the Nigerian Afcon captain at the heart of their defence but, in contrast, conceded 18 goals in 14 games when he was absent.

Left-back: Kwadwo Asamoah (Juventus/Ghana)

Although more accustomed to playing in central midfield, Asamoah uncomplainingly accepted his deployment at left wing back in Juventus’ 3-5-2 system as the Bianconeri retained their Serie A title in his debut season for the club. An eager student of the game, simply putting in a shift wasn’t enough for the gregarious Ghanaian, so he learned the intracacies of his position – seeking one on ones, beating his man, etc. The manifestation of that was his tendancy to regularly beat his man, one of the features of Juventus’ attacking plays.

Midfield: Idrissa Gueye (Lille/Senegal)

Lille would ultimately narrowly miss out on European football, but Gueye’s introduction to the team after an injury to Rio Mavuba was one of the main reasons for their resurgence in the second half of the season. The 23-year-old has steadily clocked up his footballing footprints since joining Lille, but this has surely been his breakout season. Alongside the pipsqueak Florient Balmont, he has been the playbreaker who has ensured respectability has been restored in Lille’s defensive system with his simplicity and spatial interpretation.

Midfield: Serey Die (Basel/Cote d’Ivoire)

A hasty look at the Ivorian may exude the impression that he is a fan who has won a competition to play a match. A large part of that is due to his modus operandi on the pitch: he is a hard-running, scythe-tackling enforcer who patrols the pitch with grit and determination, a grimacey type who leaves the aesthetes wincing. The performances to Die for with Basel, particularly in the run to the Europa League semi-final, have seen him force his way into the Ivorian set-up, delivering a committed display which saw him substituted to a standing ovation on his debut v Gambia.

Left-wing: Ibrahima Traore (VfB Stuttgart/Guinea)

The Stuttgart winger was one of the outstanding youngsters at the 2012 Cup of Nations, dazzling the tournament with his penetrative, relentless running. Part of a core of quicksilver attacking Guinean players, the winger would fail to quality for this year’s tournament after a shock play-off defeat to Niger. Yet that disappointment has been channelled into maturity at club level despite being in a Stuttgart side that has, at times, struggled for form. Blessed with the ability to regularly beat his man, Traore has been one of the best wingers to watch this season.

Right-wing: Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (Saint Etienne/Gabon)

This is the season Aubameyang morphed from a good player to a very good one – or at least one who was undisputedly ready for the big ride. With 19 league goals to last season’s 16 and the same number of assists with 9, the numbers suggest a subtle improvement but the omnipresent aura that is proliferating is something that’s unquantifiable unless we incorporate achievements – Marc Vivien Foe Prize (Best African player in Ligue 1), a nomination alongside Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Thiago Silva and Blaise Matuidi for Ligue 1 Player of the Season and setting a new Ligue 1 record by scoring in 7 consecutive games.

Attacking midfielder: Ahmed Musa (CSKA Moscow/Nigeria)

Coming in at just 5’7”, Ahmed Musa certainly doesn’t depict the quintessential Nigerian striker that is perpetually engraved in our retinas, but a troublesome back injury to team-mate Seydou Doumbia saw CSKA Moscow convert the promising winger into an emergency striker. Thanks to Musa’s 11 goals, CSKA would barely grieve during the eight-month absence of Doumbia as they won a league and cup double, continuing to play the Nigerian even once Doumbia was fit to start. Systematically, his dynamism gave CSKA more or a less a 4-6-0 system that, at its best, devastated the train of thoughts of centre-backs.

Striker: Wilfried Bony (Vitesse Arnhem/Cote d’Ivoire)

Daddy Cool just keeps getting cooler. Unorthodox in the way he combines top-heaviness and acceleration in short distances, his 31 goals amassed in 30 games this past season helped Vitesse Arnhem to qualify for the Europa League. With the Ivory Coast having started the arduous process of easing Didier Drogba out, Bony may not fill the grandiose shirt but it was no surprise to see him get first dibs to the single striker role in March. With mammoth Dutch Eredivisie goal-scoring figures rightly looked at with incertitude, the next step for Bony is to prove himself in a bigger league.

Honorable Mentions: Boubacar Barry, Ludovic Sane, Aymen Abdennour, Mehdi Benatia, Victor Wanyama, Mohamed Diame, Mubarak Wakaso, Mohamed Salah, Saber Khlifa, Dieumerci Mbokani, Rafik Djebbour, Kalu Uche.

It’s time to usher Didier Drogba to the Ivorian periphery

Posted: March 22, 2013 by Salim Masoud Said in African Football
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In an ideal world for Didier Drogba, the so-called golden generation with sickening footprints of failure and unsustainable psychological scarring would finally win the Africa Cup of Nations in February 2015 in Morocco, with him, then aged 36, holding the trophy aloft. But such sentiments are quixotic, for sport seldom provides such ethereal Hollywood endings. Certainly, Ivory Coast coach Sabri Lamouchi has unlocked his inner Corleone to banish the man that is a national treasure from the squad to face Gambia, a first-step gesture to confirming his state as a footballing corpse.

Many would say his exclusion was deserved. Such is the reverence for him in the Ivory Coast that there had never been a cacophonous clamour for him to stand down. Before the Afcon, of course, it would have been sacrilege to suggest the Drog, the Captain, the Leader, the Legend, the Civil War-ending Hero, should be put away, but there has been a sotto voce-acceptance of his exclusion. Drogba is at the age when insipid performances that would have once been forgiven and forgotten are now interpreted as signs of the insidiousness of the dotage process.

Drogba is idolized in Cote D’Ivoire

What’s more, the idolatry for him throughout the team and his monumentality makes him impossible to ignore when he is in the squad. That was certainly the case at the Afcon. The eldest member of the golden generation, there was a Do-It-For-Didier mantra flowing throughout the Ivorian set-up. Despite his indifferent performances, being dropped for the second match against Tunisia after Togo’s Vietnam-based Vincent Bossou marked him out of the opening game and his replacement, Lacina Traore, impressing, he was back for the crunch quarter-final tie against Nigeria. Although he would win a foul and subsequently assist Cheick Tiote’s equaliser, Nigeria’s callow centre-back partnership Kenneth Omeruo and Godfrey Oboabona were rarely troubled.

Merely blaming Drogba would only be a whiff of the post-mortem of the latest edition of the Ivorian Golden Generation Afcon-failing sequel. After all, it wasn’t the strikeforce that was the problem – they scored more than enough to win games – rather it was the disequilibrium in midfield and defence. Kolo Toure has since shown outstanding club form to dissipate the intermittent nanoseconds of narcolepsy that he displayed in January, Emmanuel Eboue has been dropped whilst composed left-back Siaka Tiene has lost his place due to a lengthy lack of first team football at PSG.

Drogba’s exclusion could also inspire a change of philosophy because he was not only a symbol of reverence but also one of reference. As I wrote in the Ivory Coast 2013 Cup of Nations preview: “the ex-Chelsea striker’s big-game bravura, completeness and leadership skills are crucial. Ivory Coast may have a phalanx of good and very good forwards on the bench, but their 4-3-3 system is tailored to Drogba and no other striker has shown they have the all-round attributes to replace him.”

Daddy Cool is ready to take over

My sentiments still stand. Les Elephants have myriad options to don the phosphorescent shirt, and all come with their coruscation and dimness. With 26 goals in 24 games for Vitesse Arnhem in the Eredivisie and a regular impact-stimulator from the Ivorian bench, Wilfried ‘Daddy Cool’ Bony is hitherto the most prolific of the contenders. He is endowed with the top-heaviness of Drogba and has the star aura that goes some way to filling Drogba’s spacious shoes, but tends to be lackadaisical when it comes to the hurly burly of pressing the opposition centre-backs and chasing lost causes. Wigan’s peroxide-haired Arouna Kona offers directness and intricate link-up play to function well in a front-two – which was experimented to devastating success in the 3-0 win over Austria – but isn’t the master-of-all-trades that Drogba was. Lacina Traore’s 6 foot 8 inches certainly provides instant grandeur and with 2 goals in 2 starts, as well as sharing a good understanding with Gervinho and Yaya Toure, it’s easy to understand why he has become a favourite of Lamouchi, he lacks mobility and remorseless finishing however. The dead-eyed Seydou Doumbia, fresh from a length injury lay-off that saw him miss Afcon, is next in line to the throne but he has often flattered to deceive at international level, albeit largely starting on the bench, and is more of a poacher. Turkish second division top scorer Gerard Bi Goua Gohou and Sochaux’s Giovanni Sio, both members of the 2010 Toulon Tournament Ivorian triumph, have received their first call-ups and are outsiders.

It will be interesting to see what happens from here on in until the 2014 World Cup, assuming the Ivory Coast qualify. It’s important they start preparing for a future without Drogba; including him in the upcoming squads would be more of a hindrance than help. Giving him a cooling off period, even for just the next 2-3 squads, whilst experimenting with the striking options only benefits Les Elephants in the long run.

2013 Cup of Nations Preview: Ivory Coast

Posted: January 14, 2013 by Salim Masoud Said in Afcon 2013 Previews, Africa Cup of Nations 2013
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Ivory Coast’s Probable XI

“I have always tried to live in an ivory tower, but a tide of shit is beating its walls, threatening to undermine,” wrote French writer Gustave Flaubert in one his famous exchanges with Russian writer Ivan Turgenev. By that token, this Ivory Coast team are so gifted that they require their own ivory tower, yet there has been a conveyor belt of teams with luck and goodwill behind them to undermine their thirst for success, or even just relative success.

Les Elephants haven’t resorted to writing letters to their counterparts just yet, but it’d be understandable if they did. At World Cups, Ivory Coast have twice been cruelly placed in Groups of Deaths; at Cups of Nations, luck has been repeatedly against them. In 2006, for instance, they reached the final, but then faced hosts Egypt in front of an exultant Cairo crowd. In 2008, they met an Egypt team which produced the chef d’oeuvre of their hegemony to beat them 4-1 in the semi-final. In 2010, they went 2-1 up in the 89th minute of a quarter-final they had dominated against Algeria, conceded in injury time and then conceded early in extra-time to eventually bow out. And in last year’s Cup of Nations final, they met a driven Zambia side with a tale behind them that the whole football world wanted to embrace.

There has been a polar variation in methodology  amidst their search for success. While they were playing fluid football from 2006 and 2010, and were coached by ex-pats, they adopted a regressive approach under the indigenous Francois Zahoui in the last edition. Consequently, they didn’t concede a single goal in the tournament and never looked like losing at any point. But this closed-all-hours policy ultimately led to their downfall and Zahoui was sacked.

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50 of the Best African Players of 2012: 20-11

Posted: January 4, 2013 by SFG in African Football, Africans Abroad
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20. Emmanuel Clottey (Esperance/Ghana) – The  striker glittered the African Champions League for Berekum Chelsea with a plethora of icy-veined finishes which saw him record a peerless 12 goals, 6 more than his nearest challenger. A hat-trick against Egyptian giants Zamalek was a highlight, but his double to salvage a draw after Berekum Chelsea were 2-0 down in Lubumbashi versus TP Mazembe was his apogee; the equaliser a delightful left-footed curler into the far top corner. Such was his impact that the Blood and Gold of Esperance dished out $1.5m, a new Ghanaian transfer record fee, for his services. Continental excellence has deservedly seen him included in Ghana’s squad for the upcoming Afcon and with extra quality in his immediate vicinity, he may just give Ghana the lethality they have been longing for.

19. Arouna Kone (Wigan/Ivory Coast) – When Kone moved from Sevilla to Levante on loan after a five-year lull, very few believed he would come anywhere near close to triggering the clause that stated that if he scored 18 goals he would have to return to Seville. But by the end of the season Levante had to abstain from playing the Dennis Rodmaniac to avoid giving him back to Sevilla. Such form was long overdue for a player who had shown such promise at PSV in the mid 2000s. His summer move to Wigan has proved his previous season wasn’t a false reawakening. Direct with the ability to delicately link up play with those around him, he has been one of the signings of the season. His international hiatus has been broken and he has deservedly made the Ivory Coast squad for the upcoming Cup of Nations.

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Meet the Potential Stars of the Africa Cup of Nations 2012: Part 2

Posted: January 17, 2012 by Salim Masoud Said in African Cup of Nations 2012, African Football
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A few days ago I, Salim, unveiled the first part of  ‘Meet the Potential Stars of Africa Cup of Nations 2012‘. Here, I bring it all home with the second and final part. Enjoy, ladies and gentlemen. Thank me later.

Bruno Ecuele Manga (23, Lorient & Gabon Centre-Back)

When Laurent Koscielny left Lorient for Arsenal, Lorient’s replacement for him came in the form of Bruce Ecuele Manga. What made Koscielny particularly standout at his time at Lorient, and alert Arsene Wenger, were his impressive statistics: 328 clearances and 159 interceptions -  which were more than any other defender in Ligue 1 in the 2009/2010 season.

Called 'Manga' but he doesn't look like someone from a Japanese comic.

Manga has continued that legacy and is third in the rankings of the defenders with the most clearances with 10 clearances per game this season. Clearances aren’t everything, of course, and Manga’s game isn’t limited to merely clearances – he is aerially very dominant and won’t shirk a battle, his performance in Lorient’s shock 1-0  away win against PSG was outstanding. Lorient, who are 10th in the league at the time of writing, have only conceded 4 goals at home this season – the joint-lowest in the league and Manga has been an ever-present. His backs-to-the-wall defending may very well come in handy, especially if Gabon are to reach the latter stages of the tournament.

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