By Aderonke Ojo
The Indomitable Lionesses of Cameroon on Wednesday night in Morocco removed the feathers of the Female Eagles of Mali 2-1 in Group D 2n match.
Galatassaras Female player, Marie Ngah’s brace finished the Malians as she got an assist from Monique Ngock to score the opener in the 14th minute before putting icing on the victory cake via a penalty goal in the 73rd minute.
A. Traore had gotten an equalizer via penalty kick for Mali in the 30th minute but the effort of the Malians was not enough to win the day.
The Malians were simply outclassed by the Cameroonians who got 17-9 shots with 4-2 on target; they stringed 383-191 passes winning 4-2 corner kicks but Cameroon came with their trade mark physical football across age groups male and female obtaining 18-8 foul calls and got 4-1 yellow cards in the process.
Mali and Cameroon senior female teams met 5 times before; Cameroon won 3 games with 2 draws thus establishing Supremacy Over Mali women; of the 14 goals scored, Cameroon scored 11.
They had two WAFCON meetings where on 17th November 2018 Cameroon beat them in their backyard 2-1 and in the 2nd leg in Yaounde Cameroon won 4-2. In the Olympics qualifier of 15th January 2011 Cameroon devoured Mali 5-0 in Yaounde and in the second leg it was 0-0. A friendly match of 16th October 2016 it was 0-0.
Cameroon ranked 71 is at the tournament for the 12th time never won the title like Ghana that is in their group and we’re three times runners up like Ghana losing the grande finale in 2004, 2014 and 2016.
Mali ranked 84 is at the tournament for the 8th time but only placed 4th in 2018.
Ghana tops Group D with 3 points scoring 2 goals with a clean slate; Cameroon is 2nd with 3 points scoring 2 goals but conceded a goal; Mali is 3rd and Cape Verde is at the bottom.
Today,Thursday Group A will start the 2nd round matches with Senegal vs Kenya at 6pm while hosts Morocco will have a Northern Derby with Algeria at 9pm.
On Friday at 6pm South Africa will play redemption match against Ivory while at 9pm it will be Burkina Faso lining up against Tanzania all in Group B.
