“We Bear The Consequences Of Our Choices”

Egypt has dashed Cameroon’s hopes of clinching an AFCON title at home. What, according to you, went wrong on the side of the Indomitable Lions?
It is very sad that the Indomitable Lions could not make it to the final of this competition. The Lions had very good scoring opportunities during the first half but we squandered all of them. During the second half, the players were very tired. I cannot imagine that a player like Ignatius Ganago who is very efficient in club was left out. The team equally have other young talents that were all left on the bench. I keep questioning myself why the coach did not bring them in. It is unfair. It made the game very uncertain. We bear the consequences of our choices. This result only shows that we are lacking somewhere and we need to wake up for future challenges. I am suggesting that we should go back to the system of home-based players. It is really unfortunate that what happened in 1972 has happened again.  I saw a lot of lack of concentration and selfishness in the second half.
Senegal meets Egypt in the final of this competition. What is your reading of this game?
Senegal and Egypt are very great nations of football and I know that the game will be good.  The best team will win the trophy. It will be based on a lot of concentration and focus.
According to you, which teams had potentials to make it far but did not and why?
There are a handful of nations which we expected to go far looking at their performances on paper. But the competition surprised us. The defending champions, Algeria are the first example. They were pushed out of the group phase. We won the 1988 Africa Cup of Nations in Morocco but we came out last in our group in 1990. It is because we thought we will just crush the other teams owing to the fact that we were the current champions. It does not work like that in football. When you came into a game with the notion that you are superior, it always backfi...