By Andrew Warshaw
February 6 – Fans of host nation Equatorial Guinea brought shame and disgrace on the Africa Cup of Nations as they forced Thursday’s semifinal to be suspended for more than 30 minutes amid scenes described as a “war zone”.
Millions of television viewers across the world witnessed chaos and confusion as bottles rained down from the stands, Ghana fans sought sanctuary behind one of the goals, riot police used tear gas and a helicopter hovered overhead when mayhem erupted shortly before the scheduled end of the 3-0 defeat to Ghana.
“It’s now like a war zone,” the Ghana Football Association (GFA) tweeted, claiming “barbaric acts of vandalism” and “unprovoked violent attacks” had taken place inside the stadium.
At first, it appeared that officials had abandoned the game to prevent further trouble. But after conflicting signals and with the stands all but emptied, the action resumed – albeit just for a couple of token minutes rather than the eight left on the clock – and Ghana played out time to reach Sunday’s showpiece final against Ivory Coast.
At halftime, the home fans vented their anger at some of the refereeing decisions and Ghana’s players had to be protected by a tunnel of riot shields as they left the field, already 2-0 up.
Matters got far worse following Ghana’s third goal, descending into chaos as Confederation of African Football (CAF) officials used the public address system to threaten to call the game off and appealing for calm.
Ghana FA president Kwesi Nyantakyi said afterwards: “I don’t think this is a fair commentary of Africa. This has been a very successful tournament and this isolated incident of violence will leave a slur on the reputation of African football. It is very unfortunate and it doesn’t deserve that…
“It’s a pity that this dark cloud overshadows our success and we really need to see some stiff action taken by the Confederation of African Football. We are lucky that we haven’t lost any lives.”
Ghana’s players were seen removing the bottles from the playing surface before the match ultimately resumed and CAF seems certain to face renewed criticism of a tournament has seen some wonderful fixtures but which has been tarnished by accusations of poor organisation after Equatorial Guinea became replacement hosts, stepping in to replace Morocco with only around two months’ notice.
Following their quarterfinal extra time defeat by the hosts, Tunisia, who conceded a highly dubious stoppage-time penalty in normal time that led to the referee being banned for six months, accused CAF of cheating and bias. The Tunisian FA have refused to apologise and the country now seems likely to be thrown out of the 2017 tournament.
CAF officials apparently declined to take questions following Thursday’s crowd trouble but Ghana’s coach, former Chelsea manager Avram Grant, expressed the views of many.
“I can’t say I wasn’t concerned, I care about the security of my players, it’s very important to me,” he said.
Equatorial Guinea coach Esteban Becker, whose unheralded side had exceeded all expectations by reaching the semis, added: “I am sad about the way the fans acted out there.”
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