The Confederation of Africa Football (CAF) has attributed its investment in coaching education, referees training, good facilities and enlargement of youth competitions as the reasons why the AFCON 2023 is probably the best, while cautioning against negative press.
The competition has witnessed a record number of goals scored with great officiating as its base, as these were shared by the Technical Study Group of CAF when it did its review of the ongoing tournament with the competition now at the semifinal stage.
Nigeria, South Africa, Congo DR and host Côte d’Ivoire are the teams still in the race for it.
Raul Chipenda, CAF's director of development led the technical study team during the review section on Monday in Abidjan.
"Many people are saying that maybe it's the best Afcon ever because of the unbelievable results. The uncertainty of knowing who will win a match. Goals being scored after the 90 minutes and I cannot also start saying things about this competition without giving a small touch to the coaches, something changed with our coaches because today we see teams, African teams going to this competition, not being afraid to fight until the last whistle of the referees. Two reasons, they are not holding results. They really want to win and this is a game changer," Raul stated.
Former Uganda International, Edgar Watson Suubi says the Good Pitches are one of the major reasons.
"The fields where the players are showcasing their talents, are very good just imagine you want to do the sports role and then the field is important for your performance. We've seen the dressing rooms, very, very good and appropriate for the coaches to do whatever they want the floodlights around the fields. We've seen before that, even the preparation itself, the training grounds, each of the teams has its control training ground where the coach can use the place as a weight and in any way that you want. So we are thinking, that's actually what has been happening. We don't realise is due to the technical quality of the city. So we're here first as a technical study group, we want to thank the national standard people who have done a wonderful job," he stated.
Statistical breakdown by High-performance specialist from Ghana, Abdul Faisal Chisbah reveals where most of the 103 goals scored so far have come from.
"We have one event three goals after 48 games. Already I've been told this is more than goals in our previous three competitions so in 2021 we have 100 goes and then in 2019, 102 goals.
"And I'm happy to share with you that many goals come from open play. many teams appeared to play from the back way to refer to consensus. We've got 72 goals from that, forming 56% of the goals scored. on set plays we also have 26 goals scored. 20% per cent of the goals scored. And in set plays you're thinking of corner kicks and free kicks all coming from wide lanes. It is a trend that we've seen this tournament teams going in both have spaces to the end of the lines, and there are ways in which through that must be why that's important. And again, we'll share that in detail later. Some more goals have come from crosses also, as I mentioned, versus in the field that goes down from the counterattack attacks, only the five goals making 4% per cent of goals and hopefully, we'll explain more about that later. And then the last one being number of shots coming from the box. Again, if you go back to the last competitions, we've had more attempts from outside the box. And based on this and what we've seen, less shots are being taken from the box again, that would mean most teams and being more conservative. That would mean teams are defending very well. I would share more on that but the good thing is we are seeing more attempts in the box which is where most goals come from," Chisbah stated.
Coach Abraham Mebratu from Ethiopia explained that although the number of goals scored from counterattack so far (5-goals) is small compared to previous competitions; it shows teams defended deeper and better and ball recovery in dangerous areas was achieved in 7 or 8 seconds.
Responding to a critical question about how the officiating team failed to Red Card Sadio mane for a bad tackle on Ibrahim Sangare in the Round-16 match, Raul Chipenda stated the this AFCON has been the best performance of referees in CAF competitions.
"This is maybe the best performance of referee in any of our competitions. There's no doubt that you are the only person i have heard saying all this. This is very bad, but anyway, just explain to you speaking about the case of Sadio Mane, I will not go into details.
"I will not be speaking about the details of one specific action in one match, but to tell you the referees were being prepared for this competition for almost three years. Most of the referees that are in this competition are the best that we have in Africa and most of them are very young because they are being prepared and the first competition that they did was the CHAN. They are in this competition separated from everybody. They are old enough, they're free and they go to the venue's to do the refereeing and then they come back to the hotel. There is no contact for our referees with anybody else," he buttressed.
Raul also revealed that CAF aims to produce the best referees in the world, that would enhance exchange with other confederations with the focus and investment they put into African referees.
The full report of the CAF Technical Study Group on the AFCON 2023 will be released later in the year.
