CAF logo
The junior Chipolopolo of Zambia on Tuesday forced the Junior Squirrels of Benin Republic to a 1-1 draw in the second match of group C of the 2023 U20 African Cup of Nations at the Alexandria Stadium in Egypt.
Rodolpho Aloko who plays for Dynamo FC with Mathieu Deguenon scored a fantastic goal for Benin in the 57th minute but hardly had the ovation vamoosed off air that Rickson Ng’ambi equalized 60th minute for the Zambians who were once under the tutelage of Nigeria’s Emmanuel Amunike who was Zambian Chief Technical Adviser.
Benin dominated play on Tuesday having 63-38% ball possession; 74 -32 accurate passes and 5-1 corner kicks but their Achilles heel was their lack of marksmanship to score goals. They could not convert more than one chance out of their four shots on target.
caf2025 AFCON:CAF withdraws hosting right for Guinea
After soccer hostilities in group C, Scorpions of Gambia tops with 3 points; Benin and Zambia share a point each while Tunisia is at the bottom with no point. Earlier, Gambia had beaten Tunisia by a lone goal.
Benin Republic had come hoping for an advancement of 2005 when they hosted and won the Bronze but qualifying again exactly 10 years after they were booted out at the first round in 2013 was a tonic to aspire to greater heights more so the team had on 27th March 2022 at the Mardan Sports Complex in Zambia, beaten the Zambians 2-1. On that day, Kampambi had opened scoring for Zambia in the 23rd minute before Soukou equalized 35th minute and Aiyegun scored the winner in the 83rd minute.
Zambia is a force at the African U20 level for they won the trophy in 2017 and placed 4th three times in 1983; 1989 and 1991
Tomorrow Wednesday at 6pm, the Flying Eagles will be playing a Reggae Blues called Redemption song against hosts Egypt as a loss in that match may indicate early exist for the team with the greatest tournament records. At 3pm, Mozambique will play Senegal that beat Nigeria 1-0.
Eniola Olatunji reporting.
#CAFU20Egypt2023
