Carlos Queiroz, the manager of Egypt, has warned the president of Cameroon’s Football Federation to watch his words ahead of Thursday’s Africa Cup of Nations semi-final meeting of the continent’s two most successful football countries.
As the president of Fecafoot, the governing body of the sport in Cameroon, is one of Africa’s greatest-ever players, Samuel Eto’o, the criticism was never likely to pass unnoticed.
Images of Eto’o — who won two Afcons with Cameroon and almost every club trophy available during a long career that peaked at Barcelona — cajoling Cameroon’s players after their quarter-final victory against Gambia have been widely broadcast.
In them, Eto’o, elected Fecafoot president last year, rouses the squad with references to the “war” they should expect against Egypt.
Queiroz said Eto’o’s language had been badly judged. “To make a declaration of ‘war’ is a very unfortunate comment,” said the vastly experienced coach. “It’s a bad approach and a very bad message to the people. I think he forgot that Cameroonian people died in the stadium a couple of days ago.”
Eight lives were lost during overcrowding around an entrance to the Olembe stadium in Yaounde ahead of Cameroon’s last-16 match against Comoros.
“Football is not about war, it’s about celebration, it’s about joy,” added Queiroz. “To challenge the Cameroon team to come and have a war? A comment like this deserves a red card.”
Safe to assume that the Cameroon football authorities will not be immediately reprimanding Eto’o, and that Caf, the African governing body, have graver issues to study, above all the continuing investigations into the Olembe Stadium tragedy that will forever define the tournament.
In Yaounde on Thursday, Queiroz will anticipate a hostile audience, perhaps the more so having upped the ante with his pre-match remarks about Eto’o. But he has cut a confrontational figure for the past three weeks.
On Egypt’s first match day, which ended in defeat to Nigeria, he was coaxed away from an argument with somebody in the stands after the final whistle, and neither of the coaching staffs of Egypt nor Morocco remained calmly positioned within their technical areas during the tetchy quarter-final, won 2-1 by Egypt after extra-time.
Queiroz was later given a warning by the Confederation of African Football (CAF), and his assistant Roger de Sa has been banned from the touchline for the remainder of the Afcon.
But Queiroz knows as well as any coach that high-stakes knockout games in a major international tournament are seldom decided without friction. At 68, he is in charge of his sixth different national team — one of them UAE, for a brief spell — and at the latest in an expansive record of major events.
Four years ago, Queiroz was guiding Iran into a semi-final at the Asian Cup in Al Ain, a chastening 3-0 loss to Japan. By then he had led Iran to successive World Cups, and a last-eight exit, on penalties, at the previous Asian Cup.
He took Portugal to the last 16 of the 2010 World Cup; he took Colombia to the quarter-final, and a defeat on penalties, at the 2019 Copa America.
To scroll back 20 years through the global odyssey of a manager who has been in charge of Real Madrid, and was twice appointed deputy to Alex Ferguson at Manchester United, would be to find him in a situation much like today’s.
Back in 2002, he was manager of South Africa, confronting Mali, the hosts, in an Afcon quarter-final. The South Africans were, on paper, the favourites. Mali, with home support, won 2-0.
On paper, there’s not too much between Cameroon and Egypt, sixth and seventh best in Africa according to the latest Fifa ranking. They are first and second in the Cup of Nations roll of honour, with seven titles for Egypt and five, the most recent in 2017, for Cameroon.
On the one side, there are the tournament’s in-form strikers, Vincent Aboubakar and Karl Toko Ekambi, 11 goals between them. On the other, the season’s in-form forward, Mohamed Salah, who has contributed two crucial goals during Egypt’s sometimes stuttering campaign at Afcon to his 23 for Liverpool since August.
The burden on Salah is always great. Injuries load still more responsibility on him to lead. Queiroz has fitness concerns over both his preferred goalkeepers, Mohamed El Shenawy having been withdrawn during the last-16 tie against Ivory Coast, and the second-choice Mohamed Abougabal 'Gabaski' having limped off the pitch late in the Morocco game. A torn muscle has ruled out Egypt’s most experienced defender Ahmed Hegazy.
