Regrets. Lots of regrets. Faced with Gabonese without panache, the Comorians managed to confiscate the ball (63% of possession), but not to vibrate the nets of their opponent. Monday January 10, at the Ahmadou-Ahidjo stadium in Yaoundé, the Coelacanths – the nickname of the national team, which takes it from a fish with fleshy fins – were beaten (0-1) by Panthers yet mined, among others , by the absence of their star, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, positive for Covid-19.
The victory is certainly elsewhere: for the first time in their history, they trod a lawn – even damaged – of an African Cup of Nations (CAN). “Gabon gave us a real lesson in realism, admitted Amir Abdou, the coach. The pressure of the first CAN match in history? Perhaps, at the beginning, we have to manage the emotions, we entered the game a little timid. We didn’t manage to develop our football at the start. “
The Comorians had yet promised not to come to Cameroon to distribute the points to their rivals in Group C (Gabon, Ghana, Morocco). “We are not here to make up the figure. Our goal is to go as far as possible. Our presence at CAN is the culmination of the work of a whole group, a whole nation. We start from far away ”, explained, before the start of the competition, Nadjim Abdou, 37, the captain.
“I professionalized the staff”
Until ten years ago, the Comoros – an archipelago off the coast of Mozambique – were drowned at the bottom of the ranking of the International Football Federation (FIFA): 198e nation out of 207. Youssouf M’Changama, 31 – who plays in Guingamp, in Ligue 2 -, is not about to forget his first selection, in 2010. “The first training, we did it on dirt, he remembers. Two or three of us slept in the same bed, because there were not enough mosquito nets in the rooms. ” Nadjim Abdou adds with a burst of laughter: “In the morning, when we got on our bus to go to the training ground, we took the taxi: we stopped to pick up people on the way. It was the summer camp. ”
In January 2014, a new coach arrived, Amir Abdou, a smiling forty-something, who has an ambition for his country: to qualify for the CAN. For this, we must first give ” a frame “ to this selection, more used to tournaments in the islands of the Indian Ocean than on the mainland. “I professionalized the staff, took an assistant, a goalkeeper coach, a video analyst, a physical trainer, a steward. There was none of this when I arrived ”, he recalls.
And for good reason, this country of less than 900,000 inhabitants has a recent history with football: a former French colony that became independent in 1975, the Comoros – name which means in Arabic “the islands of the moon” – did not join the FIFA and the African Football Confederation (CAF) than in 2005.
This “framework” allowed players “To believe in our project or our work, specifies the coach, and reassure them too ”. Especially professionals, who were born far from the Comoros, rather reluctant to cross part of Africa to wear the jersey of a selection without means or results. “To attract the pros, you have to be pro”, he insists.
“Fraternal ties”
To progress and bring the team to a higher level, Amir Abdou, who also coaches FC Nouadhibou, the champion team of Mauritania, will rely more on his diaspora – and less on players from clubs in the archipelago – , as Algeria has successfully done.
A large number of internationals were born in the Marseille region, where most of the Comorians in France live, or some 100,000 people. With poetry, the Phocaean city is considered the “fifth island” of the country. Thus, during their first CAN match, all the players in the starting eleven were born in France, including five in Marseille – six with the coach – and one in Mayotte.
“In 2010, I was the only pro and there were a few expatriates, today it’s the other way around. Binational players have made the team grow ”, emphasizes Nadjim Abdou. “After that of the coach, we tried to bring the requirement of the very high level that we had in our respective clubs”, specifies Youssouf M’Changama. Like the striker El Fardou Ben Nabouhane, who plays for Red Star Belgrade and has played in the Europa League this season. In the latest FIFA ranking, the national team now points to 132e place (out of 210 nations).
The strength of the Coelacanths is that they have known each other for many years. Internationals, especially those from the south of France, are close. “There are fraternal bonds that unite us. We are the first generation and we are still here ”, emphasizes Nadjim Abdou, who plays in Martigues in National 2. “Today, we have a new stadium in the country. I don’t have to say anything else to talk about how far we’ve come “, congratulates himself Youssouf M’Changama.
For him and his teammates, their presence at CAN also healed a childhood injury. “All the friends were represented by Morocco or Algeria, and we nothing”, remembers Nadjim Abdou. “When we were little, we didn’t exist, it’s as if we weren’t in Africa. There was a lot of rooming ”, adds Youssouf M’Changama. “When I said ‘Comoros’, I was told: ‘Cameroon?’ says Ben Amir Saadi, the former manager of the national team, who made the trip to Yaoundé. I was kicked out of college for three days because I added four points in the history books to indicate the islands of my country. ” With the qualification, “We had our revenge”, confides the captain of the Coelacanths: “We hoisted the Comorian flag on the roof of Africa. “
To hope to get to the round of 16, the Comorians will have to pass Morocco (January 14) then Ghana (18th). The great footballing nations do not scare them: in the past, they have drawn against Egypt, Togo and Morocco. “We love to play against the big teams. We feel more at ease ”, assures Amir Abdou. ” That will be difficult, we are aware of it, recognizes Nadjim Abdou, but our adversaries are not going to take us lightly. “
