Representing your country is the most prestigious badge of honour you will ever wear as an athlete. But in certain places like Cameroon, it comes at a cost, especially if you don’t perform, those who have donned the Indomitable Lions jersey can testify.
You don’t wear the green and red strip if you are not ready to sweat blood. As a custom, Marc Vivien Foe (RIP), Rigobert Song and others would always assure teammates before every game.
Standing in the middle of the lockerroom holding the jersey for everyone to see, Foe would insist: “If you are not ready to die out there, don’t put on this shirt.”
Marc Vivien Foe being stretched off the pitch in 2003 after he collapsed while playing against Colombia | FIFA Image
That is a culture that was inculcated into them by their predecessors, something that has been passed on from generation to generation.
And maybe that should explain why Cameroon don’t lose games easily at home, especially at the Stade Ahmadou Ahidjo. Cameroon last lost at home in 1998, a 3-1 defeat to Ghana but that was in Doulaa, not Yaounde.
At their football Mecca in Yaounde, they haven’t lost there since 1989 a 1-0 defeat to Gabon in the final of the regional tournament. Losing a game in national team colours tantamounts to all sorts of attacks.
The team bus will need all the protection and security they can get while leaving the stadium because there will be fans in hundreds waiting with all sorts of missiles to attack the players.
Cameroon skipper Vincent Aboubakar celebrates one of his two goals against Burkina Faso at the 2021 Africa Cup of Nations CAF Image
While that is happening, the players’ families and villages are never secure, houses can be burnt, family members attacked and gardens destroyed.
There have been incidences where the Indomitable Lions are playing and the government has to make sure their homes are guarded against any kind of attack or violence.
On 8 October 2005 at the Stade Ahamdou Ahidjo, Pierre Nlend Womé missed a 95th-minute penalty during Cameroon’s final World Cup qualifier against Egypt that would have sent the Indomitable Lions to the 2006 FIFA World Cup.
Unfortunately for Womé, he cannoned the shot off the outside of the post and Ivory Coast qualified at their expense.
Cameroon’s Pierre Wome (L) in action against Nigeria’s Augustine Okocha in the final of the 2000 Africa Cup of Nations | FIFA Image
During a press conference several days afterwards, Womé said about the penalty: “No one wanted to take that penalty. No one. Neither Samuel Eto’o nor our captain Rigobert Song.”
“Because they knew what could have happened if they missed. I have always had the courage and I went to the spot,” he added.
On Monday, November 15, 2021, Fifa.com reported that Wome’s home and family were attacked after that miss.
Wome has also time and again claimed that some Cameroon fans wanted to kill him. Reports in Cameroon say his house was burnt down.
French publication Liberation reported on October 11th, 2005: Angry young supporters ransacked the family home and various belongings of Cameroonian Inter Milan international Pierre Womé in Yaoundé.”
“They were angry with Womé for having missed, on Saturday against Egypt (1-1), a penalty which, if it had been converted, would have qualified his team for the 2006 World Cup organized in Germany.”
On 19 March 2007, Womé announced his retirement from international football. He later returned to the team in 2009 for a 2010 FIFA World Cup qualification match against Morocco.
Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting (2nd R) with colleagues celebrate a goal during the AFCON qualifiers | Courtesy photo
The other who has in recent times experienced the wrath of the fans is Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting. Born to a Cameroonian native and a German mother, Moting’s home debut is one he wants to forget.
After a poor show at the Stade Ahmadou Ahidjo, the team bus almost failed to leave the stadium because of the angry fans waiting outside.
He immediately thought of retiring from international football, until his father Just Moting convinced him otherwise.
In his next home game, Moting Sr came along and watched the game from the pitch side just to give his son confidence that nothing wrong would happen to him.
One can only imagine what awaits the team at the ongoing Africa Cup of Nation, the locals are not ready to take anything less than winning the championship.
This post was written by Clive Kyaaze, initially published by football256.com and reproduced by kick442.com as an official partner media
