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2021 AFCON QUALIFIERS: Ethiopia’s Walias stun former African Champions Ivory Coast
Ethiopia returned to winning ways when they stopped 2015 African champions Ivory Coast 2-1 in a 2021 Total Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) qualifier on Tuesday. Coach Abraham Mebratu’s team lost the first game a week ago 1-0 away to Madagascar and badly needed to win to improve their chances of qualification.
Serge Aurier silenced the home crowd with an early goal with only four minutes played. The Tottenham defender was quick to blast home after the Ethiopian keeper Abel Mamo parried back a freekick by Max Gradel.
But Mebratu continued to push his players who played a highly passing game to score through Surafel Daynachew and Shimelis Bekele after 16 and 26 minutes respectively.
In the second half the two teams continued to create descent scoring opportunities, but failed to take them. “This is a good result for us against one of Africa’s top teams,” said Mebratu after the game.
Ethiopia are now second in Group K behind Madagascar who humbled Niger 6-2.
In the other match played representatives from the Council of East and central Africa Football Associations (Cecafa) region Burundi lost at home 3-0 to Morocco in a Group E match. Mazraoui Noussair, Youssef En Nesyri and Achraf Hakimi scored for Morocco.
Despite taking an early lead through a penalty converted by Mbwana Samatta last night, Tanzania suffered a 2-1 defeat to Libya in a Group J match played in a neutral venue in Tunisia.
The 10-man Libyan side who had Hamdou Elhouni sent off scored through Samad Warfali (penalty) and Anis Mohamed Saltou.
On Monday the Harambee Stars of Kenya also settled for a 1-1 draw against Togo in Nairobi. Johanna Ololo gave Kenya the lead after 35b minutes, but Hakim Ouro leveled matters in the 64th minute.
Kenya remain second in Group J ahead of Egypt who were held by Comoros to a goalless draw.