By Ayomide Otitoju
Captain Riyad Mahrez scored in each half as 2019 champions Algeria cruised to a 3-0 win over 10-man Sudan in their Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) Group E opener on Wednesday at Moulay El Hassan Stadium in Rabat.
Mahrez opened the scoring just 82 seconds into the match, delighting the 16,115-strong crowd, largely made up of Algerian supporters. The Al-Ahli winger doubled the lead shortly after the hour mark, before Ibrahim Maza wrapped up the victory late in the game.
Among the spectators was French football legend Zinedine Zidane, whose parents are Algerian, and whose son Luca started in goal for the Desert Foxes. Zidane’s appearance on the big screens drew loud cheers from the crowd.
“I am happy to have got the three points. It is a long time since we did that at the AFCON, so the main thing for us was to win today,” Mahrez said. “As a team, we want to get to the final. We have not come here to make up the numbers.” He added that, despite the strong start, the team must stay grounded.
Algeria, eliminated in the first round without a win in the last two AFCON tournaments, wasted little time against the group outsiders. Mohamed Amoura’s cross was back-heeled by Hicham Boudaoui to Mahrez, who fired in after just over a minute.
Sudan’s hopes were further diminished when Salaheldin Adil received a second yellow card six minutes before halftime, reducing his side to 10 men. Algeria had a goal disallowed for offside through Ramy Bensebaini, but Mahrez struck again in the 61st minute, connecting with a precise outside-of-the-boot assist from Amoura. Mahrez, appearing at his sixth AFCON, now holds the Algerian record with eight goals at the tournament.
Maza, a Bayer Leverkusen substitute, sealed the win with a finish from Baghdad Bounedjah’s knockdown in the 85th minute, marking Algeria’s 100th AFCON goal. Sudan have now won only once in 17 AFCON matches since their 1970 triumph.
Elsewhere in Group E, Burkina Faso came from behind to beat 10-man Equatorial Guinea 2-1 in Casablanca. Equatorial Guinea had looked set to win after Marvin Anieboh’s 85th-minute header, but late goals from Georgi Minoungou and Edmond Tapsoba in stoppage time secured a dramatic victory for Burkina Faso.
