2012 African Cup of Nations Begins

The 2012 African Cup of Nations began in Bata tonight as history was made. After the fireworks from the opening ceremony and the laborious speeches, the tournament kicked off with co-hosts Equatorial Guinea taking part in their first ever ACN match, against Libya. Libya are entering their third tournament and started the game brightly. But Libya's major problem was their defence and Equatorial Guinea soon found themselves in behind the back line. Libya's keeper and captain, Samir Abod, looked rather frail throughout the match and his performance included a first half Massimo Taibi-esque save which went underneath him, the resulting goal was ruled out for offside.

The second half was rather dull compared to the first as the reality and enormity of not losing came into the teams' minds. But a goal did come as former Real Madrid player, Javier-Angel Balboa, beat the offside trap to finish coolly to give Equatorial Guinea their first ever win in the African Cup of Nations.

The second game of the night also came from Group A as highly rated Senegal took on Zambia. Senegal scored sixteen goals in their five qualifying games whereas Zambia only conceded three, so something had to give. Despite boasting a formidable striking force with the likes of Newcastle's Demba Ba, Lyon's Moussa Sow and Newcastle's newest signing Papiss Cisse, Senegal's defence was of a different breed. Time and time again Zambia found themselves in behind the frail back-line and it took just 12 minutes before Emmanuel Mayuka scored one-on-one against Bouna Coundoul. Zambia were in again just eight minutes later and the highly rated Rainford Kalaba made it 2-0. Senegal regrouped in the second half and produced a better performance. 28th minute substitute, Dame NDoye, pulled a goal back for Senegal with sixteen minutes left but it wasn't enough to change the result.

This would mean that if Zambia beat Libya in game two, Zambia would be almost guaranteed progression and Libya would be almost guaranteed an exit from the competition.