Côte d’Ivoire: Le retour

Cameroon’s women’s U-17 and U-20 teams will not be at the World Cup of their respective categories this year. This is considered a drop in performance given that these teams were present at the previous editions and produced acceptable results. In fact, they had rekindled a lot of hope, with many envisaging a brighter future. But all these hopes seemed to be a flight of flight. This year, none of these youth teams will experience a global stage. First it was the U-20 women’s national team that was denied a chance to take part in the FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup 2026 in Poland, billed for September by a developing football nation, Tanzania, thanks to the away-goals rule after the two teams tied 3-3 on aggregate. Then came another debacle, still a very painful one seeing the slim defeats. Cameroon’s path to the U-17 World Cup in Morocco was blocked recently by Senegal in the second round. After holding Senegal to a goalless draw in Dakar in the first leg, they failed to capitalise on this slight advantage in Yaounde. The Senegalese outplayed them, succeeded to get a draw and, keeping their composure, clinched a 5-4 win on penalties after the 0-0 aggregate. Indeed, an aching moment, especially when one thinks qualification was feasible. Nonetheless, as the players, coaches and federation mourn, they should evidently take time off to identify what went wrong and provide necessary solutions. None is unaware of the earthquake that shook the U- 17 women’s team just before the previous World Cup in Morocco: the sacking of coach Briand Ndoko and the appointment of Ndoumou Mike on an interim basis. Since then she has been at the helm of this team with the evident assistance of coach Hassan Balla, who is also managing the U-20s. In effect, it is virtually the same staff handling all the women’s selections. It should be said that after the firing of coach Jean-Baptiste Bis...