Libya beat Gabon today (2-1) with suffering and comeback and was placed leader of group F qualifying for the Qatar World Cup 2020 in the official return of high competition football to the country after seven years of civil war and of the Spanish Javier Clemente to the bench of the North African team.
“Las Panteras”, led by the lanky Arsenal forward Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, they took the lead in the 11th minute thanks to a good play that culminated Andre Biyogo Poo, Göztepe (Turkey) midfielder.
But after a hesitant start, in the 28th minute of the first half Ali salama, center-back for Al-Madina SC, from the Libyan league, equalized the match, and in 89 Heal the Warfalli, Raja de Casablanca winger and one of the few Libyan players who plays outside his country, brought delirium to the stands of the Los Angeles stadium. Martyrs of Benina, from the eastern city of Benghazi, in his first official match since the start of the civil war in 2014.
Victory places Libya in the first position of the group tied at three points with Egypt, the great favorite, who defeated 1-0 Angola.
And it represents a severe setback for the aspirations of Gabon and Aubameyang, a growing team seeking the milestone of qualifying for the first time for the final phase of a World Cup.
The Libyan federation trusts, for its part, that the new stage of Gracious that officially starts today is as successful as the previous one, in which the Spanish coach achieved the only continental title that the country has in its showcases, the Africa Cup of Nations for Players Playing on the Continent (CHAN), raised in 2014 in South Africa after a scoreless draw and an agonizing penalty shoot-out against Ghana (4-3).
Although the 71-year-old Basque coach already led the North African team on June 19 in the defeat against Sudan (0-1) in an Arab cup match played in Doha, today’s was its debut in Libyan territory and in a major international competition.
Gabon and Libya they had faced each other three times to date, with a victory for Libya (2-0) in the first friendly deputy in 1999, and with home victories for each team with the same result (1-0) during the qualifying round for the final phase of the 2010 World Cup, to which none reached.