Exciting close to unpredictable Group F expected as Tanzania, DR Congo clash

KORHOGO, Ivory Coast

An exciting photo-finish is expected in Group F of the TotalEnergies CAF Africa Cup of Nations on Wednesday evening when two-time champions, DR Congo take on Tanzania at Korhogo’s Amadou Gon Coulibaly Stadium. 

DR Congo are second behind group leaders, Morocco while Tanzania are bottom of the group but have an outside chance of qualification should they get all three points against the Leopards.

The Tafia Stars have not enjoyed a good start to their campaign following their 3-0 loss to Morocco which was followed by a 1-1 stalemate against 2012 champions, Zambia. 

In DR Congo, they are up against a motivated side who are yet to lose a match, but yet to register a victory either having drawn both their matches by 1-1 against Zambia and Morocco. 

This is what the coaches and players had to say:

Hemed Suleiman – Tanzania assistant coach 

“After travelling yesterday, all our players are fine. We know we are going to face DR Congo tomorrow. It’s a final for us. We tried to work on our problems. These games are hard but there is solidarity in the group. Ours for now is to focus on tomorrow’s game. We have to forget about the previous games and focus on this new task. 

Mbwana Samatta – Tanzania Forward

“All the teams are difficult. Looking at the levels of both teams, we can never look down on DRC and think it will be easier than Morocco or Zambia. It is not an advantage playing against them in the last fixture. They will not be easily beaten, if anything, they will be even harder to beat”.

 

Sebastien Desabre – DR Congo Coach 

“We intend to give our best. The pitch is slightly different, but we have to continue. We are confident and concentrated on the task. We playing to win and its very important that we win. We need the victory, and we also want to qualify because that is very important.  We do not want to find ourselves in a situation of making calculations. We want to win and gain automatic qualification because anything less than that puts our fate outside of our hands”.

Yoane Wissa – DR Congo Forward

“We will intensify our efforts. The match will decide our future in the competition. Our aim is to have a good match tomorrow. We didn’t get a result in the last two matches. We made some mistakes and high-level matches such as these are about the finer details. We have character and we will fix our mistakes. This AFCON has had many surprises, and it is proof that if you want to win, you need to work hard for it”.