São Paulo – This Monday (30th), Sudan broke a 36-year-long football taboo. The country made it to the last-eight phase of the Africa Cup of Nations after defeating the Burkina Faso national team by 2 to 1. Next Saturday (4th), the team coached by Mohamed “Mazda” Abdallah will play Zambia for a slot in the semi-finals of the tournament, held in Equatorial Guinea and Gabon.
The team finished second in group B and qualified to the next phase with “help” from Cote D’Ivoire. To move forward in the contest, Sudan had to beat Burkina Faso for a goal difference of at least two, or else count on Angola to lose by a similar difference. And that was what happened: Sudan won 2 to 1, and Angola lost to Cote D’Ivore by the 2 to 0 needed.
In addition to having qualified to the last-eight phase for the first time in more than three decades, Sudan also scored for the first time after 36 years in this tournament. The goalless run was ended in the 2-2 tie with Angola. In its debut in the contest, Sudan lost to Cote D’Ivoire, featuring star player Drogba, by 1 to 0.
The Sudanese Khaled Olbada, who manages two Brazilian players and one Brazilian coach, said the peple in Khartoum went out in the streets at the end of the match to celebrate the qualification. He even dreams of seeing the country’s players in European stadiums already. “This will be great for our team and will open many doors for our players to be hired, even by European teams,” he said. Olbada lived in Brazil up until 2002. Now, he is an Arabic-to-Portuguese translator and the manager of players Paulo Sérgio and Jean Lalana, and coach Elton Petry.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
