Rwanda will face off with Guinea for a place in 2020 African Nations Championship semi-final at Limbe Omnisports Stadium on Sunday night.
Kick-off is at 2200hrs CAT.
Rwanda booked a place in last eight after finishing second in Group C while Guinea topped Group D with five points.
The Amavubi registered only one win in the group stages where they defeated the Sparrow hawks of Togo 3-2 to qualify for the quarter-finals.
Guinea top-seeded Group D and remains unbeaten in their last four African Nations Championship games. Their mission to win their first CHAN title continues and a win over the East Africans will take the dream closer.
For Rwanda, they remain unbeaten in their last six CHAN games, but their head coach Vincent Mashami acknowledges the quality of Guinea and vows to approach the game with discipline.
“Guinea is a very good team, they have good quality on the ball which is one of their strengths, we will cope with that by staying compact and staying true to our qualities. We want to win tomorrow’s game at all costs because it is the bridge towards our main objective,’’ said Mashami in an interview.
Mashami will be welcoming two of his key players after they recovered from their respective knocks. Eric Zidane Nsabimana and Bertrand Iradukunda had sustained injuries during their third group match against Togo.
Guinea will be eyeing their second appearance in the semifinals after the 2011 edition in Sudan when they finished fourth.
The Syli Nationale are the highest-scoring team in this year’s tournament as they have netted six goals but their defence has not been so good. They have soaked three goals against Rwanda who have conceded only two times.
With Yakhouba Gnagna Barry’s form of having netted in his last two games, the West Africans have a strong scoring threat.
But if Mohamed Kanfory Bangoura is excited about the Horoya AC’s man form, then he has every reason to be more worried by the sharpness of Rwanda’s Jacques Tuyisenge whose scored the winning goal in their last group match.
“We must be careful against Rwanda”, Guinea coach Bangoura stressed. “We had a 2-2 draw with Tanzania, a team from CECAFA zone. Now we are facing another team from the same region in Rwanda.”
The winner will face Mali in the semi-final of African Nations Championship that will be played at Japoma Stadium on February 3rd.
