Roster for Final African Cup Qualifier

August 30th, 2007 | By: Rami | 7 Comments »

While Tunisia has already sealed its place in Ghana 2008, it remains to be seen whether they will top group 4. Currently we are first with 13 points and Sudan is in second with 12. The match that will determine who gets higher seeding in the African Cup takes place on September the 9th in Khartoum. It will be interesting how we do in a hostile environment against a motivated team that wants to prove that it’s first qualification in more than 30 years is no fluke. In our previous meeting (at home), our play was rather uninspired and we could only win 1-0 on a Sudanese own goal. Lemerre has made it clear that he’s looking for more than just a result. He wants the players to execute a collective gameplan and “fight like the cadets (U17) players did at the world cup.”

Earlier this month I predicted that Tunisia would go unbeaten in their upcoming matches. Since we drew Guinea 1-1 and we have yet to face the UAE and Austria, there’s a good chance this can still occur. Not so sure if I’m willing to extend this prediction to the Brasil game that is supposedly planned for November. I say supposedly because I’ve only seen one source. It happens to be the main sponsor of the African Cup so I’m pretty sure it can be trusted but until I see it on fifa.com I can’t be completely certain. Whatever the case, the fact that no Tunisian newspaper that I’ve read recently has even mentioned this proposed tie is somewhat disconcerting. I remain hopeful that will change soon enough. A game against Brasil would be truly delightful.

Here’s the list of players called up for the match in Khartoum. It’s basically the same group that played versus Guinea:

Hamdi Kasraoui : EST
Aymen Mathlouthi : ESSahel
Arbi Mejri : CSHLif
Wissem Abdi : Ezzamalek
Saber Ben Fraj : ESSahel
Chaouki Ben Saâda : Bastia FC
Adel Chedli : FCSion
Med Amine Chermiti : ESSahel
Yassine Chikhaoui : FCZurich
Sylva Dos Santos : FCToulouse
Wissem El Bekri : EST
Fatah Gharbi : CSSfaxien
Seïf Ghezel : ESSahel
Karim Hagui : Lever Kusen
David Jemmali : Girondins de Bordeaux
Issam Jomaâ : FCCaen
Jawher Mnari : FCNuremberg
Khaled Mouelhi : Lillestrom-SK
Karim Nafti : CSSfaxien
Houcine Ragued FCMons
Mejdi Traoui : ESSahel
Alaeddine Yahia : SCSedan
Chaker Zouaghi : Locomotive Moscou

Any insights? Complaints? Predictions? Holla.

Tags: African Cup, Brasil, Ghana 2008, Sudan, Tunisian Soccer

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Comments

By thamer | August 31st, 2007 at 5:59 pm

first question is…where is zaiem? i dont think he was in the squad to play against asec this weekend so maybe hes injured, but if he isn’t, he definatly needs to be in the squad. it’s also about time that mohammad ali nafka got called up. he’s no doubt one of the best players in the league and its only a matter of time before he goes to europe. although our defenders are decent, apart from haggui and jemmali, none of them are used to the strong opposition of european clubs(yahia doesnt count) hopefully some of our young defenders in the league will be scouted by european clubs soon ( the ben amors on css?) other than that, i like the team. chikhaoui and jemma are quite a tandem up front and should be finding the net frequently this january in ghana.

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By thamer | August 31st, 2007 at 6:01 pm

“i dont think he was in the squad to play against HILAL this weekend”

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By massaer | August 31st, 2007 at 7:06 pm

I’m still not giving up on seeing Benachour on this team.

By massaer | August 31st, 2007 at 7:09 pm

And how come Lemerre takes Santos who hasn’t played this serason and who is just not in Elie Baup’s plans?

By Rami | September 1st, 2007 at 1:07 pm

I agree with you Thamer. Zaiem has to be in the team, haven’t heard any news about him but if he’s not in i’m guessing that he got hurt. our defense is pretty solid but we do need some more of our young guys getting out into some tougher leagues where they face higher quality strikers. not that we don’t have any of our own but… going to europe is almost always a good thing.

And Mass, I don’t know if they trust Benachour like they used to. It could be some behind the scenes stuff that we don’t even know about. I mean he did manage to turn one coach against him at PSG, don’t see why the national team would be any different. I get the feeling Lemerre doesn’t like people that draw that much attention to themselves. What’s your theory? Cuz I know you usually have one.

Funnily enough, the press in Tunisia is asking the same question as you did about Santos. Cuz Lemerre made this big proclamation before the Guinea game that he would only be picking players that are asserting themselves at their clubs and showing they deserve a callup. This obviously doesn’t apply to Santos and Lemerre knows it. Someone asked him and he went on a rant about how Santos deserves the call up for encouragement and to see what level he’s still at etc. Basically the guy gets called up cuz he’s one of our most potent offensive threats. He’s scored so many goals for us in African Qualifiers and Cup games that we feel a need to stick with him. Santos did create the goal against Guinea so it’s fine with me that he’s in the team. He leads the line really well and it’ll be interesting if he can create the same rapport with the Jemaa Chikhaoui tandem that Thamer mentioned (the same kinda rapport he had with Jaziri. Those guys have some telepathy going on and they really complement each other well). One thing about Santos though is that he needs a team BADLY. He’s really at out of favor at his club. Does anyone know potential places he could be going to? I heard something about Sochaux…

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By Massaer | September 2nd, 2007 at 2:23 pm

The theory we had Jay and me was that he slept with Vahid’s daughter or something. But more seriously, when he came back to Paris after being loaned twice, He was supposed to be Ronaldinho’s substitute. But VAhid just decided one day (after he scored a goal no less) that Boskovitch was better for the team. Benachour never played again. Which is why the craziest stories are floating around that.
But lemerre is just an old fart who likes his ideas and who doesn’t like change. And he’ll stick to his guns until it’s too late. Remember France in 2002? That’s how bad it can get. He doesn’t like to try new things. So i don’t think Benachour will get his shot unless he comes back to France and becomes Ribery.
But to be totally honest, why the fuck did he go to Russia and to a club that doesn’t even manage to be in a European competition. The guy is 26 and somewhat known. Playing in belgian second division would be a better choice.

By Rami | September 5th, 2007 at 12:14 pm

I’m afraid Ben Achour just took whatever money he could get without thinking about the future of his career. If he was still in a club like PSG, Lemerre wouldn’t have a choice. But since he’s basically exiled himself to Siberia (no offense), he shouldn’t be surprised that no one is paying much attention, if any…

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