Morocco on top as Group of Boredom springs to life

SEGOU, Mali, Jan 26 -- Morocco went to the top of Group B in the African Nations Cup with a 2-1 victory over Burkina Faso in a lively match Saturday. The Atlas Lions' hero was striker Hicham Zerouali from Scottish Premiership club Aberdeen, who scored before and after Moumouni Dagano had hit the target for the Stallions.

Morocco coach Humberto Coelho told AFP immediately after the thrilling encounter: "This is certainly a good result for us and we played good football. "I also want to commend Burkina Faso. They are good and strong. They fought till the very last."

And against South Africa here on Wednesday, the coach dismissed any suggestions they will settle for a draw.

"I don't go into a match thinking of settling for a draw. If you think negative, you could end up losing. We're going there to take the three points as we did today," he said.

The victory took 1976 champions Morocco to four points, Ghana and South Africa have two each and Burkina Faso one. In the final group matches Wednesday, South Africa face Morocco here and Burkina Faso meet Ghana in Mopti.

Burkina Faso captain Oumar Barro said his team deserved at least a draw from this match but all the same they look forward to making amends against Ghana. "We are very disappointed," he said.

'We only have ourselves to blame for letting in the second, it was a stupid goal. We should not have lost concentration at all."

He added: "I think we at least deserved a draw from this match. What we now have to do is to forget this game and focus on the final match against Ghana. We have no other choice."

The group winners and runners-up qualify for the quarter-finals of the biennial African championship being staged by the landlocked west African state of Mali for the first time.

After three consecutive goalless draws in this agricultural town 220 kilometres north-east of the capital, Bamako, the section was labelled the Group of Boredom.

But Zerouali ended the goal drought in the 23rd minute on a hot afternoon made more bearable by a strong downfield wind when he opened the scoring after a comedy of errors.

"I'm happy I scored today. But this was really a team effort. We played well as a team and we deserved our victory," said Zerouali.

"We will go into our next game with a lot more confidence."

Saifou Mady and Mamadou Tall failed to clear a free kick and, after two Moroccan shots were miscued, Zerouali struck a low shot wide of goalkeeper Mohamed Kabore.

Zerouali was unlucky early in the second half as his chip rebounded off the post with Kabore stranded and this stirred Burkina Faso into action which led to a 58th-minute equaliser.

A Burkinabe free kick just outside the penalty area deflected past the Moroccan wall and Dagano reacted quickest to head over injury-prone Morocco goalkeeper Driss Benzekri.

Another Dagano header struck the crossbar and Benzekri pushed the rebound over for a corner while Salaheddine Bassir was let down his by poor ball control when put through at the other end.

Morocco snatched maximum points in the 85th minute when a slow-reacting Burkinabe defence failed to clear a corner and Zerouali saw his header beat Kabore and two defenders for the winner.