That’s it from me. Thanks for reading and for your emails and tweets.
Congratulations to Ivory Coast and roll on Sunday! What a final that is against Nigeria.
Cheers!
Jonathan Wilson's match report
Franck Kessié is named player of the match. He certainly had a good game in midfield, but I would have been tempted to go for Adingra, who caused havoc for DR Congo all across the forward line.
Updated
An email from Kári Tulinius:
Sébastien Haller has had such a strange match. He’s clearly not fully fit, and while his body isn’t performing at full capacity, his intelligence has seen him take advantage of every mistake by the Congolese defense. If he were at his normal level, he’d have a hat-trick by now. Not that he’ll care, if his single goal gets the Elephants to their date with destiny.
From the first whistle until Haller scored, Ivory Coast’s fans in the stands all looked they’d been emotionally wrung out by the madcap journey from the opening match to the semi-final. Now, at the final whistle, they look fully revived. I know where in the world I’d like to party tonight.
Yep, Haller was not at his best but ultimately proved the matchwinner. Initially, I thought it might have been bad goalkeeping from the DR Congo keeper Mpasi, but replays show that the ball had a vicious topspin after bouncing off the turf. The ball shot up in the air and dipped wickedly below the crossbar. No keeper in the world was saving that. A lucky goal, perhaps, but Ivory Coast created more than enough to win.
It was a fierce atmosphere and that seemed to really play a part for Ivory Coast. Remember it was in Abidjan that Ivory Coast lost 4-0 to Equatorial Guinea in the group stage. Now they are 90 minutes away from winning the Africa Cup of Nations in their own country.
Disappointment for DR Congo and a repeat of the 2015 semi-final.
DR Congo started both halves with real impetus and verve, and could have easily taken the lead. But they faded badly, and really didn’t look like scoring towards the end.
Updated
Full-time: Ivory Coast 1-0 DR Congo
A deserved win for the hosts, who will face Nigeria in the Afcon final!
Updated
90+4 min: Ivory Coast look more likely to score than DR Congo, who look completely disjointed in attack. They can’t get anything going. Instead Bamba goes through on goal, rounds Mpasi, but can’t get his pass back to a teammate. Corner to Ivory Coast, and they will surely waste more time now.
Updated
90+2 min: With DR Congo now pouring forward, there are gaps at the back. Amani is so close to breaking in on goal, but only a brilliant last-ditch tackle from DR Congo’s Baka stops the Ivory Coast substitute from bearing down on goal.
90 min: Five nervy minutes added on here.
88 min: It’s been 18 years since a host nation made an Afcon final: Egypt in 2006. Ivory Coast have a chance to do exactly that as they try to waste a few more seconds with a couple more substitutions. Gradel and Haller come off for Boga and Krasso. Replays show that Boga had his shirt on backwards as he tried to come on! He was corrected by a teammate.
My word, though, Ivory Coast do have strength in depth. Remember Wilfried Zaha didn’t even make the squad this tournament.
Updated
86 min: Seko Fofana, now on the Ivory Coast bench, is acting a sort of cheerleader in front of the home supporters, whipping them into a frenzy as he roars and throws his arms around. Didier Drogba looks nervously on, as the cameras pan to him. Ivory Coast look comfortable here, but this has been a tournament of late twists!
84 min: Ivory Coast make another change: Jonathan Bamba, the subject of a many a transfer rumour over the years while he was at Lille, comes on for the excellent Simon Adingra.
82 min: DR Congo break on the counter attack. Bongonda breaks one challenge on the half-way line and for a moment it looks like he has a clear path to goal, but a slight dalliance with a dribble allows Konan to get back and make a tackle.
78 min: Ivory Coast deserve to be ahead, which is completely at odds with the rest of their tournament. They have been always been the chasers, and have sneaked their knockout wins in extra-time and in a penalty shootout. Now they must manage the game out as the leaders.
76 min: Elia has a snapshot from the edge of Ivory Coast’s area, volleying just wide. I think that is just the second DR Congo attempt on goal this second half, after Bongonda’s early effort. They do not look like a team chasing this game. The subs thus far have failed to make an impact.
74 min: Another cooling break. DR Congo are not dead yet.
72 min: Haller so nearly doubles Ivory Coast’s lead! Inches from 2-0! An awful defensive header from Kalulu (I think) gifts possession to Haller, who races through on goal. With Mpasi off his line, Haller takes a first time shot, lobbing the DR Congo keeper, but his effort bounces inches wide!
70 min: Triple change for DR Congo. Manager Sébastien Desabre is rolling the dice. Cedric Bakambu, Yoane Wissa and Charles Pickel are replaced by Aaron Tshibola, Fiston Mayele and Simon Banza. That is a big call, taking off your two experienced forwards in Bakumbu and Wissa.
68 min: I can’t show you a video of the goal, but it was basically the footballing equivalent of this.
Who says that hockey players can't play #hoops #fromdowntown #basketball bounce pass shot pic.twitter.com/0o5J5l1YAL
— Gordon Swift Maxwell (@WIldman90GTron) June 17, 2017
GOAL! Ivory Coast 1-0 DR Congo (Haller 65)
Haller scores and the Alassane Ouattara Stadium explodes! The Ivory Coast empties as the hosts celebrate! Not only is that Haller’s first goal at this tournament, but his first shot on target! Gradel works some room on the right wing, digs a hopeful cross out and Haller finds some space as he peels off to the back. The Dortmund striker takes the cross first time on the volley, the ball smashes into the ground and bounces high into the air, looping over Mpasi and into the corner! Wow. Not the cleanest strike, but Haller won’t care!
Updated
62 min: Changes for Ivory Coast: Amani and Nottingham Forest’s Sangaré on for Seko Fofana and Seri.
60 min: That was Ivory Coast’s first shot on target, by the way. Not that it’s been a bad game, mind. It’s just the hosts have been wasteful.
58 min: Good strike from Kessié! Some good play from Seri and Gradel helps the ball find Kessié is acres of space on the edge of DR Congo’s box. He has options left and right, but goes alone with a ferocious left-footed strike. It’s straight at Mpasi, who punches it away. Better from Ivory Coast.
56 min: Haller is growing increasingly frustrated at Ivory Coast’s build-up play, which is pretty slow. The Dortmund man holds his hands up in the air at his teammates.
53 min: A missed opportunity for Ivory Coast, as Seko Fofana just need to poke a simple pass through to Adingra, but the Al Nassr midfielder fails to get the connection on the pass to beat Baka.
50 min: Seko Fofana and Kessié are to big units in the Ivory Coast midfield, but both have guile and class to boot. The latter, Kessié, is running the show. Pickel is struggling to deal with the former Milan man.
48 min: Bongonda nearly scores with his first touches of the ball! DR Congo’s Belgium-born winger controls a tricky pass instantly, beats Seri with a neat shimmy, ghosts past Ndicka and fires wide from just eight yards out. It was an acute angle from the right but Bongonda will be disappointed not to hit the target, he did the hard part!
Updated
Peeeeeeeep! Looks like there is one change and it’s for DR Congo: Bongonda comes on for Kakuta. This is now the DR Congo XI that started the win over Guinea in the quarter-finals.
The players belatedly re-emerge from the dressing rooms. Wily Boly is sporting some sort of bandage on his head, Terry Butcher style. Ah, he’s taken it off, and appears to have some sort of cut above his left eye.
Coverage moved swiftly from the first semi-final to this match, so I missed the pre-match national anthems, but I should also flag the gestures made by DR Congo players. Their collective response is related to the ongoing conflict in their country.
Powerful moment from DR Congo squad. They used the national anthem to raise awareness for the atrocities ongoing in Eastern Congo. 🇨🇩🤐 pic.twitter.com/BzYFaCGRWR
— EuroFoot (@eurofootcom) February 7, 2024
This is a useful reference for what is going on in the country.
Half-time reading:
Half-time: Ivory Coast 0-0 DR Congo
It’s all square at the break. DR Congo started well but have faded badly.
45 min: Three minutes added on here.
43 min: DR Congo just want to get to half-time now.
41 min: Kessié hits the post! What do Ivory Coast have to do to score?! The former Milan midfielder pounces on a loose ball on the edge of DR Congo’s box, unleashes a fierce low shot through the legs of Moutoussamy, but the ball cannons off the bottom of Mpasi’s post! DR Congo get away with another one!
39 min: Haller misses a sitter! Singo with surely one of the crosses of the tournament – a deep, zipping curler to the back post, which completely leaves Mbemba beaten. Haller watches it all the way, and completely unmarked on the six-yard box, heads inexplicably wide! That wasn’t even close. Emerse Faé has his head in his hands, as does a watching Didier Drogba in the stands. The latter would surely have put that chance away.
37 min: DR Congo are slightly hanging on here. Adingra is popping up all over the pitch, now in a central area. He drives at DR Congo’s midfield, beating Pickel, before Bakumbu brings him down.
34 min: Bicycle kick from Haller! Adingra floats a tempting cross to the back post. DR Congo’s Kalulu just does enough to clear but the ball finds its way to Haller in the box. His first touch is away from goal and the second is an overhead kick, which flies over the bar!
Updated
32 min: Adingra, easily the best player on the pitch tonight, has switched the right wing for Ivory Coast and runs the full length of the pitch with the ball at his feet. He reaches the byline and wins a corner off Baka. Great work from the 22-year-old.
30 min: A cooling break for the players. It’s around 28° in Abidjan at the moment.
28 min: Point blank save from Ivory Coast’s Fofana! A hopeful cross found its way to Wissa at the back post, but the Brentford forward saw his shot expertly blocked by the foot of Fofana! Replays show that Wissa was offside, but Fofana wasn’t to know that.
26 min: Remember, Gradel played in the 2015 Afcon semi-finals against DR Congo, of course. He was later named in the team of the tournament as Ivory Coast went on to beat Ghana on penalties in the final.
24 min: Max Gradel, who played for Leicester and Leeds in the same period that Kakuta was at Chelsea, has since amassed over 100 caps for DR Congo. Gradel drives at Masuaka but the West Ham defender wins the duel.
21 min: Kakuta was also at the centre of this story back in 2014.
19 min: Kakuta – former Chelsea wonderkid of course … back in 2009 – tries his luck from range, but on his weaker right foot. Easy enough for Fofana.
17 min: Just wide from Adingra! Ivory Coast go close! Singo whips a brilliant ball to the back post and the Brighton man rises highest, planting a header a yard wide. DR Congo’s Mpasi was absolutely stranded.
14 min: Adingra gets his first run at Kalulu on the left wing for Ivory Coast. Adingra puts in a dangerous low cross, but Mbemba is there to turn it behind. From the corner, Mpasi flaps at the delivery but just does enough to take the cross away from Boly.
11 min: DR Congo making all the play in the early stages. This is not the start that Ivory Coast interim manager Emerse Faé will have hoped for.
GOAL DISALLOWED FOR DR CONGO!
8 min: Wooooooow, a goalkeeping howler from Fofana as he fumbles another Masuaku cross. Bakambu prods the loose ball away from the Ivory Coast goalkeeper, and nods it into an empty net. But no! The referee gives a foul on the goalkeeper. That’s very harsh on DR Congo. I thought Bakambu won the ball fairly. Fofana got very lucky. The home supporters were awfully silent there. It remains 0-0.
6 min: Yoane Wissa leads a DR Congo counter-attack. I’ve been so impressed with the 27-year-old in this tournament, and indeed since his move to Brentford from Lorient in 2021. Corner to DR Congo. Masuaku whips one to the near post, and it nearly goes straight in! Haller nearly vacated the near post but recovered to clear the ball behind with his head. Fofana in goal was struggling to get there!
4 min: A clumsy challenge from DR Congo’s Pickel on Fofana, who takes a nasty knock in the small of his back.
2 min: The noise is absolutely deafening at the Alassane Ouattara Stadium. Both teams are feeling themselves out, both lining up in a 4-3-3.
Peeeeep! And we’re off.
Straight now to Abidjan for our second semi-final.
Hosts Ivory Coast and DR Congo take to the field.
Max Gradel captains Ivory Coast, with Serge Aurier suspended.
DR Congo are led by Chancel Mbemba. The rest of the team are wearing black armbands owing to the conflict in the country.
Updated
Nigeria are through to the Africa Cup of Nations final!
They beat South Africa 4-2 in the shootout!
Kelechi Iheanacho scores the decisive penalty to send the west African side through, where they will face one of Ivory Coast or DR Congo!
The eighth time Nigeria have reached the final!
Updated
End of extra time in the other semi-final! It finishes Nigeria 1-1 South Africa!
To penalties we go! Remember, South Africa’s Ronwen Williams saved four penalties in the shootout win over Cape Verde in the quarter-finals. Can he be the hero again?
I thought this preview from Jonathan Wilson was excellent.
In the other semi-final, we’re half-way through extra time between Nigeria and South Africa, with the scores locked at 1-1. William Troost-Ekong gave the west African side the lead from the penalty spot after 67 minutes, before a 90th-minute equaliser from Teboho Mokoena, also from 12 yards, sent the game into extra-time.
The teams!
📋 𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐗𝐈 📋
— CAF (@CAF_Online) February 7, 2024
See how both sides are lining up today! 🇨🇮🇨🇩 #CIVRDC | #TotalEnergiesAFCON2023 pic.twitter.com/GqfzPFvTxU
Preamble
“After all that we endured, we are no longer afraid of anything”.
What a sublime, ridiculous tournament this has been and no team has embodied the wild energy of this Afcon more than the hosts, Ivory Coast. It was Elephants midfielder Seko Fofana with the above quote in the lead up to this semi-final with DR Congo and there is a sense of destiny for the home nation to reach the final, such are the obstacles that Ivory Coast have overcome to reach the final four.
Two group game defeats – including a humilating 4-0 loss to Equatorial Guinea – left Ivory Coast without manager Jean-Louis Gasset and on the brink of elimination. It was only a number of surprise results in the other groups that allowed them to progress with just three points, as the fourth of four third-place teams.
Under caretaker manager Emerse Faé, Ivory Coast have also snuck through both knockout rounds: scoring a late equaliser before a penalty-shootout win over Senegal, before an even more dramatic quarter-final against Mali.
If Ivory Coast were hoping for a straightforward semi-final, this is not it. Four players are suspended – Odilon Kossounou, captain Serge Aurier and Christian Kouame and Oumar Diakite – with the latter sent off against Mali for removing his shirt in the celebrations of his 121th-minute winner.
To complicate things further, DR Congo are increasingly looking like a real force at this tournament. They have a fine team, with Marseille’s Chancel Mbemba, Brentford’s Wissa and West Ham’s Arthur Masuaku all getting on the scoresheet, the latter scoring one of the goals of the tournament, an eerily similar effort to one he scored against Chelsea back in 2021 (although he did later admit the Chelsea goal was a fluke).
GOALS. ⚽️
— CAF (@CAF_Online) February 4, 2024
Brilliant. Stunning. Dazzling. 💫
That’s how we described the best goals from the #TotalEnergiesAFCON2023 quarter-finals! 🤩@1xBet_Eng pic.twitter.com/1V2Q1NAE8H
DR Congo also have an external motivation, with conflict continuing to blight the country, with many players speaking out in this tournament. The UN peacekeeping mission is withdrawing, and fighting has recently intensified between government troops and the M23 rebels in the east of the country, while attacks by Islamist groups on civilian targets go on.
“Everyone sees the massacres in eastern Congo. But everyone is silent,” DR Congo and Real Betis striker Cédric Bakambu wrote. “Use the same energy that you put into talking about the Nations Cup to highlight what is happening with us. There are no small gestures.”
🇨🇩 Tout le monde voit les massacres à l'Est du Congo. Mais tout le monde se tait.
— Cédric Bakambu (@Bakambu17) February 5, 2024
Mettez la même énergie que vous mettez pour parler de la CAN pour mettre en avant ce qu'il se passe chez nous, il n'y a pas de petits gestes. pic.twitter.com/PUZCavuckC
It all adds up to an intriguing match. Ivory Coast are the favourites in Abidjan, but this Afcon has rarely gone to form and DR Congo are more than capable of an upset.
Kick-off: 8pm (local time and GMT)
