Guinea qualified for the Africa Cup of Nations quarter-finals in bizarre fashion on Thursday after a drawing of lots was required to separate them and Mali. They will go through to a quarter-final on Sunday in Equatorial Guinea's capital Malabo against Group C winners Ghana while unfortunate Mali go home. The surreal event took place during a meeting of the tournament Organising Committee at a hotel in Malabo and was attended by AFP.
A representative of each team was sent to take part - each picked out a green ball with the winning one containing a piece of paper marked with the number two inside. Amara Dabo, the financial director of Guinea's sports ministry, picked out the winning ball, with national football federation president Boubacar Baba Diarra representing Mali. "It is the worst kind of cruelty to force a team to do this," Diarra said after. "We would have preferred to lose on sporting criteria, which is why the CAF (Confederation of African Football) must look again at their rules.
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