AFCON Daily: Knock out games kick off [Episode 9]

Hello and welcome from where ever you are on the globe as we focus on Africa’s most important event the afcon in Egypt.

After two days or rest it is time for some more action as the round of 16 takes off today Friday with two matches on the program.

The atlas lions who recorded a 100 per cent group stage will take on Benin who managed to slip through as one of the best third placed teams.

A potential upset could spring up when Uganda takes on Senegal, one of the competition’s favourite in the second match of the day.

Senegal refuses to consider their opponents as under dogs and will take the game from the blast of the whistle.

Uganda must muster and display mental stability following their recent match bonus crisis that caused the players to boycott training session earlier this week.

A promising spark tonight from two teams with parallel journeys at the tournament.

So the time is 7:00 p. m. GMT. But before that, Morocco will face Benin with the status of a big favorite. Especially with French man Herve Renard who previously won the competition twice with Zambia in 2012 and Ivory Coast in 2015.

Benin will already feel satisfied sailing through the group stages but ambitions can change in the course of the competition so they will not be a ride off for Morocco especially after pinning down the defending champions Cameroon to a goalless draw.

Another forfeit for Congolese striker Jonathan Bolingui who suffered from a knee injury , making a list of players including Guinea’s Naby Keita, Ivorian Serge Aurier, Senegal’s Edouard Mendy and Ghana’s Christian Atsu.

That’s all we had time for today enjoy your weekend and most importantly enjoy the knock out stages of the afcon, see you on Monday with all the results and updates but you can get some more sports news on africanews.com, bye for now.

@philemonmbale