Cup Winners’ Cup. 34 teams were going to play in the issue – not all African countries entered the competition (South Africa was still banned, Ethiopia) and not all teams actually played, as usual. UDIB (Guinea Bissau), Al-Ahly (Libya), and Nakiyubo Villa SC (Uganda) withdrew without playing a game in the first round. The next one was USK Algiers (Algeria) which decided to quit after losing the home leg to BFV FC (Madagascar) 1-3 in the ¼ finals. The surprise winners reached the ½ finals – a great success for a team from Madagascar, but miracles do not happen every day: Bendel United (Nigeria) quickly eliminated them 1-4 and 0-0. In the other semifinal surprise happened, though: Gor Mahia (Kenya) lost to Al-Merreikh (Sudan) 1-0 and 0-2. Thus, the finalists were clubs never reaching such a stage before: Bendel United vs Al-Merreikh.
Al-Merreikh hosted the first leg and won 1-0. Fragile lead, which actually benefited the Nigerians and they were expected to win the trophy, but the Sudanese fought as much as they could and extracted scoreless draw: 0-0. The Cup was theirs to enjoy.
Bendel United – not to be confused with better known Bendel Insurance – were… new club. They qualified to the tournament as Flash Flamingos, which was the Nigerian Cup losing finalist in 1988. Then they were bought by the Bendel State Governor Tunde Ogbena and renamed Bendel United. Under the new name they entered the Cup Winners’ Cup and were about to make their own miracle, reaching the final and considered the stronger team there. But they lost, only to prove the deeply embedded fragility and whimsicality of African football – personal ambition was hardly the best driving force, too much dependent on political winds and changing interests.
Although an old club, as the date on their (old) logo tells, Al-Merreikh (Omdurman) was obscure club, as it was Sudanese football in general. Today they play under slightly changed name and different logo, but certainly their greatest year was 1989 – and not just for the club and its fans, but for the whole Sudanese football: they were only the second Sudanese club to reach African Cup final, but the first to win it (Al-Hilal reached the Champions Cup final in 1987, but lost to Egyptian Al-Ahly).
Such fantastic success, which was never repeated, expects some historic pictorial material, yet… there is practically none. No faces, no names… The team bringing the greatest success in the history of Sudanese football remains mysteriously unknown. What is known, though, is the name of their coach: the German Ernst Roeder.
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