WAFU Nations Cup 2001

A continuation (after an interruption of 15 years) of the West African Nations Cup or "Zone 3" Championship. held from 1982 to 1987

WAFU = West African Football Union, founded in 1975 on the instigation of Senegal; all current 16 members joined in the same year.

NB: teams are allowed to field home-based players only

Pre-Qualifying Round
Niger         w/o Guinea Bissau   [Niger withdrew]
[Apr 7] 
Mauritania    0-1 Cape Verde 
  [Tomy Ramsis 33]

Qualifying Round 
[Apr 7] 
Gambia        ppd Burkina Faso    [Burkina Faso stranded on the way]
Benin         w/o Togo            [Benin withdrew]
Sierra Leone  w/o Guinea          [Guinea banned by FIFA] 
Mali          3-0 Liberia
  [Cheick Oumar Dabo 15, Soungalo Diakite 66, Biramablen Traore 80]
[May 13]
Cape Verde    1-0 Ghana U-20
  [Tu 63pen]
[Jun 10]
Guinea Bissau 1-4 Ivory Coast 
[Jul 7]
Gambia        1-0 Burkina Faso   


Final Tournament 

Originally scheduled for Dakar, Senegal, Sep 28-Oct 7, 2001;
it was first postponed to October after CAF had refused to give
approval claiming it was too close to the African Nations Cup
2002; after WAFU argued that their tournament was for home-based
players only, approval was obtained, and the tournament then
moved to Abidjan, to be held in October 2001.  It was then 
postponed because the main sponsors, TV Africa, pulled out.

The tournament was newly arranged for Sep 18-29, 2002, to be
held in Ivory Coast (Abidjan and Bouaké; the latter venue being
added at the last moment); a military coup attempt on September 
19 in Abidjan, Bouaké and Korhogo has led to an indefinite 
postponement with the teams having arrived in the country already.
The teams lodged in Bouaké were trapped there for over a week
before being able to leave.

Group A (Bouaké)
[Sep 18]
Senegal       1-0 Sierra Leone
  [Kéita Abdoulaye 5]
Ivory Coast   5-0 Gambia
  [Grah Congo 5, 40, Gato Gaé 17, Brou Donatien 28, Bernard Kouakou 89pen]
[Sep 20]
Senegal       n/p Gambia
Ivory Coast   n/p Sierra Leone
[Sep 22]
Sierra Leone  n/p Gambia
Ivory Coast   n/p Senegal

Group B (Abidjan)
[Sep 19]
Togo          n/p Mali
Nigeria       n/p Cape Verde
[Sep 21]
Mali          n/p Cape Verde
Nigeria       n/p Togo
[Sep 23]
Togo          n/p Cape Verde
Nigeria       n/p Mali

Nigeria (and possibly other countries) sent their U-23 team.

NB: competition abandoned (see above).

Semifinals [Sep 26]

Third Place Match [Sep 29]

Final [Sep 29]

WAFU Nations Cup overview

2010

About this document

Thanks to Myk Cameron and Mikael Jönsson for additional information

Prepared and maintained by Jason Soffe for the Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation

Author: Jason Soffe
Last updated: 18 Jan 2018