Dar es Salaam. Young Africans (Yanga) on Wednesday broke a long-running jinx against North African teams following their 1-0 away win over Club Africain of Tunisia in the CAF Confederation Cup return leg at the Stade Hammadi Agrebi in Tunis.
Yanga’s goal was scored by Stephane Aziz Ki in the 79th minute following Fiston Mayele’s knockdown on edge of the area to silence their opponents.
The goal’s build up started from Farid Mussa and Salum Abubakari in a thrilling encounter. The two teams recorded a barren draw in their first leg held a week ago at the Benjamin Mkapa Stadium in Dar es Salaam.
The Jangwani Street giants have qualified for the group stage of the competition for the third time in their history after they did so for the first time in 2016 and reached the top eight and in 2018 they managed to qualify for the top 16.
However, the record shows that Yanga suffered defeats and eliminated by teams of North African countries (Arabs) in the Caf competitions for many years.
In 13 knockout and group stage matches, the record shows, Yanga failed to shine in 12 matches starting from 1982 when they were edged out by Al Ahly on 6-1 goal aggregates in the African Champions League.
However, Yanga managed to knockout Mozambican side Textil do Pungue on 4-1 aggregate score to face Al Ahly, whom they drew 1-1 at the home venue and later lost 3-0 in Cairo. The Jangwani Street giants were also eliminated by Al Ahly in 1988 on 4-0 goal aggregates after recording a barren draw at the home venue before losing 4-0 in Cairo. Yanga were also eliminated by Ismail in 1992 on 3-1 goal aggregates, by El Mereikh of Sudan (2-0), lost 6-0 to Raja Casablanca in 1998, defeated 3-0 by Esperance of Tunisia (2007) and lost 1-0 to Al Akhadar of Libya. Other North African teams that managed to eliminate Yanga from the CAF competitions are Zamalek of Egypt and Etoile Sportive du Sahel of Tunisia. Yanga head coach Nasreddine Nabi commended his players for the victory last Wednesday, saying that they are now waiting the group stage draw to know their opponents. Yanga have been placed in port two with DC Motema Pembe of DR Congo. Other teams that qualified for the group stage are TP Mazembe (DR Congo), Pyramids (Egypt), Asec Mimosas (Ivory Coast), USM Alger (Algeria), Diables Noirs (Congo Brazzaville ), Saint-Éloi Lupopo (DR Congo) and Future of Egypt.
Others are Al Akhdar (Libya), Real Bamako (Mali), ASFAR Rabat ( Morocco), Rivers United (Nigeria), Marumo Gallants (South Africa), Asko Kara (Togo) and US Monastir of Tunisia.
Meanwhile, this year’s CAF Confederation Cup will have new champions after defending champions RS Berkane failed to make it into the group stage, following the conclusion of the additional second preliminary round on Wednesday. Berkane, who won the title last season after edging out Orlando Pirates on penalties, were held to a 0-0 draw by Tunisian side US Monastir in the return fixture.
The Tunisians progressed 1-0 on aggregate, having won the first leg 1-0 at home. Two other Tunisian sides CS Sfaxien and Club Africain did not make it through.
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