5 Africa Cup of Nations semi-finals facts
Five facts on the Africa Cup of Nations semi-finals ahead of the last-four matches in Equatorial Guinea this week.
Ghana’s Christian Atsu (2nd L) celebrates with team mates after scoring against Guinea in their quarter-final soccer match of the 2015 African Cup of Nations in Malabo February 1, 2015. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh (EQUATORIAL GUINEA – Tags: SPORT SOCCER)
Ghana defeated Ivory Coast 4-3 in 1968 and Mali won by the same score against Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo) four years later in the semi-finals that produced the most goals.
The longest Cup of Nations semi-final penalty shootout was in 1988 with Nigeria pipping Algeria 9-8 on spot-kicks after a 1-1 draw following extra-time in Morocco.
Zambia trounced Mali 4-0 in 1994, Morocco defeated the Malians by a similar score 10 years later and Egypt overwhelmed Algeria 4-0 in 2010 for the biggest semi-finals winning margins.
Four Cup of Nations tournaments had no semi-finals with mini-league formats used in 1959 and 1976, and in 1963 and 1965 the winners of three-team groups qualified directly for the final.
Ethiopia (1962), Zaire (1974), Algeria (1980), Ghana (1982) and Nigeria (1984) staged the biggest comebacks in Cup of Nations semi-finals with all of them wiping out two-goal deficits to reach the final.
