{"id":1442,"date":"2026-01-03T23:40:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T23:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/1442\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T23:40:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T23:40:11","slug":"sadio-mane-inspired-senegal-reaches-africa-cup-quarterfinals-after-beating-sudan-national","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/1442\/","title":{"rendered":"Sadio Man\u00e9-inspired Senegal reaches Africa Cup quarterfinals after beating Sudan | National"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>RABAT, Morocco (AP) \u2014 Sadio Man\u00e9 led Senegal to the quarterfinals of the Africa Cup of Nations after a 3-1 win over Sudan in Tangier on Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>The 2019 and 2022 African footballer of the year chased and harried, and set up goals and chances for teammates, leading by example in the absence of <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/koulibaly-red-card-senegal-afcon-96caa250077f0bea18a9451676ec587b\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">suspended captain Kalidou Koulibaly<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Man\u00e9 set up midfielder Pape Gueye\u2019s first goal of two and substitute Ibrahim Mbaye\u2019s goal to seal the win, sending the Lions of Teranga, the 2021 winners, through to a quarterfinal against Mali or Tunisia, who were playing in Casablanca later.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe needed to dig deep,\u201d said Senegal coach Pape Thiaw, whose team faced an early setback.<\/p>\n<p>Aamir Abdallah stunned the favorites when he fired in Sudan\u2019s opener in the sixth minute.<\/p>\n<p>It was the first and last goal scored by a Sudanese player in the tournament. The Falcons of Jediane defeated Equatorial Guinea in the group stage thanks to an own goal.<\/p>\n<p>The Sudanese, who played all of their qualifying matches away from home as the country contends with <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/sudan-war-africa-cup-afcon-9088e83d6c37eb4d4660bf5bb4fb8ad5\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">a brutal war and humanitarian crisis<\/a>, made a confident start against Senegal and did not hold back in going for another.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I am sure the Sudanese people know that we came to this competition and proudly represented them,\u201d Sudan coach James Kwesi Appiah said.<\/p>\n<p>Senegal was a challenge too far.<\/p>\n<p>Isma\u00efla Sarr twice drew saves from Sudanese &#8216;keeper Monged El Neel, Man\u00e9 missed another chance, and El Neel saved again from Mohamed Eisa, Gueye and Nicolas Jackson, before Man\u00e9 set up Gueye to score in the 29th.<\/p>\n<p>Senegal kept pushing and Gueye got the second before the break, this time set up by Jackson.<\/p>\n<p>Goalkeeper \u00c9douard Mendy denied Sudan an equalizer after it, before Senegal resumed its dominance.<\/p>\n<p>The 19-year-old Mbaye made his entrance as a substitute in the 74th and Man\u00e9 set up the youngster to wrap it up on a break three minutes later.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"RABAT, Morocco (AP) \u2014 Sadio Man\u00e9 led Senegal to the quarterfinals of the Africa Cup of Nations after&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1443,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[63,1602,323,264],"class_list":{"0":"post-1442","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-africa","8":"tag-africa","9":"tag-senegal-mali-sudan-tunisia-afcon-africa-cup","10":"tag-soccer","11":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1442"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1442\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1443"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1442"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}