Author: Vesselin

Canada. Two new teams were added to the professional league – Kitchener Spirit and London Lasers. Northamerican fashion, the league was divided in Eastern and Western Divisions, but since most clubs were located in the East, the Eastern Division had 7 teams and the Western only 4. Of course, the championship was stretched and complicated – in the East every team played 3 times against the teams of its own Division and twice against those in the other Division. In the West every team played 4 times against the other clubs in the their own Division and twice. That way every teams played 26 games in the first stage, after which knock-out phase started from quarterfinals to the grand final.
Newcomers Kitchener Spirit dressed fashionably after the German team.
Vancouver 86ers and Hamilton Steelers reached the final and it was no contest – Vancouver sailed to 6-1 victory.
Hamilton Steelers. They only showed that Canadian football was concentrated in the West and even not the whole West, but just in the city of Vancouver.
The champions left no photo of themselves – at least not one in wider circulation – which was an ample testimony of the real popularity and importance of football in the country. Vancouver 86ers was clearly the best club in the country in every detail, which made them dominant – 3rd title in a row.

Costa Rica. 1990 was a great year for Costarican football – fantastic debut at the World Cup finals. The World Cup was the focus, so the championship was stopped for a long time and finished much later than usual. The success of the national team during the break very likely motivated the Federation to make changes for the next season – originally, one team was relegated from the 10-team top Division and one promoted from Second Division, but that was changed in the later stage of the championship – the top league was increased to 12 teams for the next season and the relegated team stayed plus one more team was promoted. On the other hand, there was no final of the championship and not all results managed to reach statistics. The championship was in two stages: first the normal league stage in which all teams played 3 times against the rest. The top 6 teams qualified to the second Hexagonal stage and the last was relegated. The winners of the first and second stage played the championship final – but if the same team won both stages there was no final for lack of opponent.
From second level AD Municipal Generalena was promotion. One more team was promoted by the end of the year.
AD Palmares ended last in the first stage of the championship with 16 points and was relegated. By the end of the year they were no longer relegated, because of the enlargement of First Division. AD Guanacasteca finished 9th. AD Municipal Puntarenas – 8th and AD San Carlos – 7th. For those teams the season ended early. The rest qualified to the second stage, but since no results and final table exist today one has to follow only the opening stage of the season: CS Cartagines was 6th.
CS Herediano – 5th.
AD Limonense – 4th.
CS Uruguay de Coronado – 3rd. Standing from left: William Mejía, Ronny Díaz, José Luis Guillén Gallardo, Carlos Vivó Quirós, Miguel Jasper Simpson Lacey, Rodolfo Jarret. Crouching : Juan Morales, Guillermo Guardia, ?, Franco Benavides, Ronald Salazar.
LD Alajuelense – 2nd.
CD Saprissa – 1st. Standing from left: Geovanny Ramírez, Alexis Camacho, Benjamín Mayorga, Geraldo Da Silva, Evaristo Coronado, Eddy Picado. First row: Roger Flores, José Jaikel, Vladimir Quesada, Víctor Badilla.
Saprissa left no doubt who was the strongest in this season: in the first stage they lost just 3 games and left second-placed Alajuelense 8 points behind (still 2 points for a win were given). Then won the Hexagonal second stage as well, so there was no final as such, for Saprissa won already everything. One more title for the leading Costarican club.
In view of the success of Costa Rica at the World Cup, it is perhaps interesting to see how the known squads were represented: Uruguay de Coronado had no national team player. CD Saprissa had 8 players in the national team – however, in the team above only 3 are present: Roger Flores, Jose Jaikel, and Vladimir Quesada. That means… either the club had strong and fairly equal squad, so variety was no problem, or those who impressed at the World Cup went to play abroad. Speculations, of course. Little remained from this championship other than statistical results.

Copa de Campeones y Subcampeones CONCACAF 1990. With African and Asian international tournaments becoming more orderly, CONCACAF sunk down as the foggiest: not just withdrawals, but discrepancies about participants (Juventus was listed as a team representing Belize, but since two other clubs from Belize played, this was impossible – so it was a phantom team of unknown origin) and unknown to this very day results. The tournament’s formula, dividing teams geographically into 2 sections – Northern and Central amalgamated at the end and Caribbean – clearly discriminated against the stronger teams from North and Central America, especially the Mexican participants, but perhaps there was no other way to avoid constant Mexican finals and to keep the small nations in the many islands interested in the Cup. At the end, the final was against America (Mexico City) and Pinar del Rio (Cuba) – the winners were known in advance…
Final (Feb 19 & Mar 12, 1991)
Pinar del Río Cub América Mex 2-2 0-6 2-8

First leg
February 19, 1991, La Habana, ref: Ramesh Ramdhan (TRI)
Pinar del Río 2-2 América
[Oswaldo Alonso 20, Osmín Hernández 43; Guillermo Huerta 25,
Antonio Teodoro Dos Santos “Toninho” 31]
Pinar del Río: Martínez, Torres, Osmin Hernández, Cata, Sainz, Reyes, Dacourt (43 Del Pino), Rivera, Oswaldo Alonso, Pedel, Mezquia;
América: García, J.Hernández, Rodón, Tena, De Los Santos, Farfán, Domínguez, Guillermo Huerta, Antonio Teodoro Dos Santos “Toninho”, Luis R.Alves Zague, Cristóbal Ortega.

Second leg
March 12, 1991, Ciudad de México, ref: Majid Jay (USA)
América 6-0 Pinar del Río
[Antonio Teodoro Dos Santos “Toninho” 3, 9, 84,
Luis R.Alves Zangue 68, 80, Osmín Hernández 85og]
América: García (46 Chávez), J.Hernández (70 Guillermo Huerta), Rodón, Tena, De Los Santos, Domínguez, Cristóbal Ortega, Farfán, Muinguia, Antonio Teodoro Dos Santos “Toninho”, Luis R.Alves Zague; Coach:Carlos Miloc
Pinar del Río: Martínez, Cata, Osmin Hernández, R.Torres (74 C.Torres), Sainz, Dacourt, Reyes, Pérez (62 Rivera), Mezquia, Oswaldo Alonso, R.García.

America won the final.
Pinar del Rio played a second CONCACAF final in a row and no doubt the team did their best, but the difference in class was enormous. In any case, this was perhaps the highest moment in Cuban football – two consecutive CONCACAF finals – so, nothing to be ashamed of, but the contrary.
Sure winners and perhaps America even allowed their Cuban opponent to get a draw in the first leg, but that was all grace or pity could permit. America won the continental trophy for 3rd time.

Asian Champions’ Cup.
The formula was as follows – the preliminary round went rather complicated group round-robin tournaments hosted by one country each. Group 2, played in Bahrain, doubled the Gulf Cooperation Council Club Tournament and one team actually had no right to play in the Champions’ Cup, so its results mattered only for GCCCT, but… on them also depended who will qualify in the next round of the Champions’ Cup. After the preliminary qualification groups the semifinals followed in the same fashion: 11 teams were divided into 2 groups, played in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – Group A, and Group B in Jakarta, Indonesia. The group winners qualified to the final, played in the usual two legs, home and away. Three teams withdrew (Al Deffatain – Amman, Al Muharraq – Bahrain, and Al Arabi – Kuwait) – the reasons, as usual, were political. Nissan FC (Japan) won the reduced Group A and Liaoning (China) – Group B, and went to the final. Interestingly, both teams played against each other already, both qualifying from the preliminary Group 5. Liaoning won the group back then, but the Japanese scored 11 goals in 3 games, permitting only 1 in their net – it was the winning goal Liaoning against Nissan, making them group winners. The final was really between equal opponents and once again 1 goal was the crucial difference: Liaoning won the first leg at home 2-1 and then kept 1-1 tie at Yokohama.

Liaoning triumphed and celebrated their victory in Communist style. Kind of.

Nissan FC – or Nissan Motors (Yokohama) reached the final for the first time and lost minimally. Sad, but not that bad at all. Japanese football was already going into full professionalism, there were foreign players, and the whole structure was going into massive reorganization – which included changes of names and new league, the J-League. Very soon after playing the Asian final Nissan FC would be no more – at least under that name. From the perspective of the professional reorganization of Japanese football, the relative success of Nissan FC was just a sign confirming the need of such a change: it was clearly the right time to move up a step.

Liaoning brought the first club success for Chinese football, confirming its improvement, which was mostly organizational. Since China was lagging behind South Korea and Japan, the success was mostly a boost, showing the right direction. As a club, Liaoning already had experience – they played at the Champions’ Cup final in 1986-87, when it was a group round-robin format and finished 3rd among the four finalists. This time they were winners, becoming in a way a motor for the Chinese organization of professional football and establishing themselves as a leading club. Historic victory not just for the club, but for the whole Chinese football.

African Player of the Year. For a long time the best players were from the most successful teams and it is futile to ask were the voted best really the best players during the year. Thus, the four players at the top of African voting in 1990 represented Cameroon and Algeria as expected. Rabah Majer (Algeria and FC Porto, Portugal) and Francois Omam-Biyik (Cameroon and Rennes, France) shared 3rd place with 60 points each. Tahar Cherif El-Ouazzani (Algeria and Aydinspor, Turkey) was voted 2nd with 64 points. But that was only academic… the three players’ combined record of 184 points failed short by far from the winner’s 209 points. The year’s favourite had no rivals at all and he was Roger Milla.
Such was charm of the World Cup’s ‘discovery’ and instant international fame of practically retired player. And because of the Cameroonian success, a tiny anonymous club from tiny anonymous country also became known, as if to play one more joke on modern football. For, if anything, Milla still had some kind of a club he played for and records require writing down… Roger Milla, Cameroon and Saint-Pierroise (Saint-Pierre, Reunion). After retiring from professional football, Milla kind of settled in the small island in the Indian Ocean and kicked the ball a bit for fun with the local team. And since he kicked the ball, he was not retired, wasn’t he? Saint-Pierroise won the championship of Reunion as it was, so Milla won a trophy too – hard to argue he was a retiree after his World Cup fame, which eventually brought some light on his playing activities during the year. Anyhow, those amusing facts and questions meant very little after he surprised the world, became instantly everybody’s darling, and outperformed much younger great starts collecting huge paychecks from European big clubs.
After all, it was not Milla’s winning the championship of Reunion, but his World Cup performance and goals, instrumental for the best ever African performance at World Cup finals and propelling Cameroon to the ¼ finals – and almost to the ½ finals. Of course, his first goal against Colombia remains immortal, even if Rene Hiquita’s arrogance is largely to blame. At the end, Milla deserved to be continental player of the year more than anybody else – and it was the second time he was voted number 1 African player – the first time was in 1976, solely based on the successful performance of his already third club: Tonnere (Yaounde). This success propelled him to professional football in France, where he played for 5 clubs in 10 years without getting much notice: funny in way, but Milla was voted African number one when playing for amateur African clubs, but not when playing professionally in France. And he was discovered twice – the first time at 24, when he was noticed by professional French clubs, and second time, when he 38 years old and retired. Amazing comeback, which was really comeback, for Milla left Reunion and returned to active playing in Cameroon at the end of 1990 and played until 1996 for Tonnere (Yaounde) and abroad, adding one more World Cup and new records. It was not a Cinderella story – it was granddad story, unique. Unique even in terms of the rising of African football: 1990 was the last year the African player of the year was actually playing for African club – after that will be only players playing for big European professional clubs voted best. To a point – perhaps a big point – Milla made African players valuable and truly recognized.

Cameroon. Arriving at very respectable position at world stage hardly meant big improvement in the domestic scene – African football as a whole was full of problems which proved only to be stubbornly persisting. No need even to try listing them: the Cameroonian season statistics would suffice – the exact result of the Cup final this year is still unknown. The numbers in the final league table are odd: the draws, there is one more loss than wins, 8 more goals scored than conceived. Apart from that… no problems. In general, the basic rivalry remained between the cities of Yaounde and Douala, each having 4 teams in the First Division. The Cup was won by Prevoyance (Yaounde), which prevailed over better known Tonnerre Kalara (Yaounde) in penalty shoot-out. The game ended 1-1, but for the shoot-out two scores exist: 6-5 and 5-1. Whatever it was, Prevoyance was the winner – their first Cup victory.
They also played very strong regular season, finishing 2nd in the championship – but a distant second: 12 points behind the champions. 3 points were given for a win this season, but even if ‘traditional’ point system was used Prevoyance was still far behind. As a whole, Yaounde performed better than Douala, but lost the championship. Anyhow… Union Sportif (Abong-Mbang), Maiscam (Ngaoundéré), and Vautour (Dschang) won promotion from Second Division. Elecsport (Limbe) finished last in the top league, Aigle Royal (Dschang) was 15th, and Dynamo (Douala) – 14th – those teams were relegated. Two more Douala clubs finished near relegation zone: Unite was 12th and Caiman 11th. Yaounde teams did much better: Diamant – 6th, Canon – 5th, Tonnerre Kalara – 4th, Prevoyance – 2nd. Panthere (Bangangte) finished 3rd and that only because of worse goal-difference than Prevoyance’s.
Union (Douala) reigned supreme: 17 wins, 8 ties, 5 losses, 43-24 goal-difference and 59 points. Nobody was able to challenge them – Prevoyance and Panthere were left 12 points behind. Excellent season and 4th title for Union, but they had to wait 12 years for it, so one can imagine the joy of a victory waited so long. Considering the great success of Cameroon at the World Cup, it is interesting the see who played for the top teams in the country: Panthere had no players in the World Cup squad. Prevoyance – only 33-years old Emmanuel Kunde. Union (Douala) had 2 players: Bonaventure Djonkep and Roger Feutmba. Only Djonkep played at the World Cup – 20 minutes at all, coming as a substitute against Colombia.

Algeria. One of the best organized championship in Africa – steady league system, the top 3 levels at least: 16-team top division, 16-team Second Division, Third Division divided regionally in 6 groups, most of 16-teams as well and the lowest relegated down to 4th level. Good organization brought good results and respect – Algeria hosted the African championship finals this year and won. JS Kabylie won the Champions Cup. And they were at the top domestically. So, in brief: WA Tlemcen won Second Division with 42 points, followed by CS Constantine with 41 – both teams were promoted to the top league.
USM Alger was last with 23 points in First Division. RC Relizane ended 15th with 26 points. Those were the relegated to Second Division this season. Up the table:

MC Alger – perhaps better known internationally as Mouloudia Alger – was 3rd with 34 points.
MC Oran – or Mouloudia Oran, the African Champions Cup finalists in 1989, was 2nd with 36 points.
The champion was the same as in the 1988-89 championship: JS Kabylie (Tizi-Ozou). Only they changed their name between the two seasons, so the 1988-89 was JE Tizi-Ouzou, but the club was the same and 1989-90 was fantastic season for them – not only Algerian champions, but African champions as well. And a good round record they made as well: it was their 10th title.

Cup Winners’ Cup. Only Al Suguar (Libya) withdrew and that in the first round, so this tournament also advanced smoothly to the final, opposing Club Africain (Tunisia) to BCC Lions (Nigeria). Both teams were first-time finalists and unlike the Champions Cup final, here everything was decided in the regular games and more precisely in the first leg.
Final (Nov 24 and Dec 8)
Surulere National Stadium, Lagos and El Menzah Stadium, Tunis
BCC Lions (Gboko) Nga Club Africain Tun 3-0 1-1 4-1
[Fuludu 38pen, Agum 84, Igwilo 89]
[Lofti Mhaïssi 77; Angwe 36]
[details 1st leg:
BCC Lions: Abbingi – Agum, Elijah, Ugwu, Afiomah – Igwilo, Cassidy (Toyin
Ayinla), Fuludu, Kpakor (Alumum Aule) – Angwe, Humphrey Jebba.
Coach: Amadou Teby Shaibu.
Club Africain: Tayèche – Bergaoui, Saïdi, Adel Rouissi, Amdouni – Sellimi,
Abdelhak, Nasri, Yaacoubi – Touati (Bouhali), Faouzi Rouissi.
Coach: Faouzi Benzarti.
ref: Ali Hadih (Tanzania); att: 30,000;
yellow card: Tayèche (Club Africain);
red cards: Yaacoubi (Club Africain), Cassidy, Ayinla (BCC Lions)]
[details 2nd leg:
BCC Lions: Abbingi – Agum, Elijah, Ugwu, Ndubueze, Afiomah – Igwilo, Toyin
Ayinla, Fuludu (Cassidy) – Angwe, Humphrey Jebba (Kpakor).
Coach: Amadou Teby Shaibu.
Club Africain: Mazghaoui – Bergaoui, Adel Rouissi (Saïdi), Amdouni, Lofti
Mhaïssi – Sellimi, Lofti Rouissi, Nasri, Mehri (Abdelhak) –
Touati, Faouzi Rouissi. Coach: Faouzi Benzarti.
ref: M. Cadressen (Mauritius); att: 50,000;
yellow cards: Sellimi, Amdouni (Club Africain), Agum, Fuludu, Abbingi,
Ugwu (BCC Lions);
red cards: Agum, Angwe (BCC Lions), Mhaïssi (Club Africain).]
Club Africain practically lost the final in the first leg – badly beaten 0-3, the Tunisians were unable to come back. Still, reaching the final was great success for them.
First, but comfortable and well deserved international trophy for BCC Lions (Gboko). Perhaps anonymous team – with the exception of the right full-back Agum – but that only in perspective, for the great Nigerian stars of the 1990s were yet unknown internationally. BCC Lions also confirmed the leading status of Nigerian football in Africa, adding one more trophy to already impressive list victories.

African Champions Cup. The tournament was becoming more and more orderly – only one team withdrew this time: the 1989 Cup holders Raja Casablanca (Morocco) in the ¼ finals. All the way to final went JS Kabylie (Algeria) and Nkana Red Devils (Zambia). The Zambian reached final for the first time. Trickier case, the Algerians – the team from Tizi-Ouzou were known as JE Tizi-Ouzou until this year and won the Champions Cup in 1981. Now they were JS Kabylie, aiming for a second success. In the fashion of the time, the winner was decided by penalty shoot-out.

Final (Nov 30 and Dec 22)
Stade Olympique (“5 juillet”), Algiers and Independence Stadium, Lusaka
JS Kabylie Alg Nkana Red Devils Zam 1-0 0-1 1-1 5-3p
[Rahmouni 47pen]
[Amos Bwalya 80pen]
[details 1st leg:
JSK: Amara – Sadmi, Adghigh, Rahmouni, Meftah, Karouf – Ladjadj (Benkaci),
Adane, Saïb – Aït Tahar, Medane. Coaches: Stefan Zywotko, Ali Fergani.
Nkana: Shonga – Chizumira, Modon, Malitoli, Phiri – Amos Bwalya, Chishimba,
Muselepete, Sakala, Masela – Kenneth Malitoli, Sikawze (Kazika).
Coach: Moses Simwala.
ref: Badara Sène (Senegal); att: 70,000;
yellow cards: Medane, Saïb (JSK), Chishimba, Modon, Malitoli, Kazika,
Chizumora (Nkana)]
[details 2nd leg:
Nkana: Shonga – Chishimba, Chizumira, Modon, Malitoli, Amos Bwalya –
Muselepete, Kabwe (Kunda), Sakala, Masela – Kenneth Malitoli,
Chambeshi (Sikawze). Coach: Moses Simwala.
JSK: Amara – Sadmi, Adghigh (Hafaf), Meftah, Karouf – Ladjadj, Adane, Saïb
(Aït Tahar) – Djahnit, Medane. Coaches: Stefan Zywotko, Ali Fergani.
ref: Idrissa Sarr (Mauritania); att: 35,000;
yellow cards: Chizumora, Muselepete (Nkana), Amara, Djahnit (JSK)]
The captain of JS Kabylie received the trophy.
Playing at the final was the highest achievement of Zambian football and Nkana Red Devils was worthy finalist. A bit of luck was on the Algerian side at the end, but still the Red Devils did well.
JS Kabylie triumphed – perhaps they were more deserving than Nkana Red Devils because of experience, but their victory came only in the lottery of penalty shoot-out.
Standing from left: ? – Stefan Zywotko – coach – Fergani – Rahmouni – Djanit – Meftah – Saib – Adghigh – Amara ;

Front row: H.Amaouche – Karouf – Adane – Ladjadj – Medane – Sademi
First or second trophy? Hard to tell just like that, but Algerian football was almost professional already, the club was ambitious and in great form, so well deserved success. Second Champions Cup for the club from Tizi-Ouzou.

African Cup of Nations. Algeria hosted the finals, so they and Cameroon as reigning African champion directly qualified. The other 6 teams were decided by the qualifications. As usual, there were countries which withdrew: Uganda, Gambia, Mauritania in the preliminary round, Togo, Sierra Leone, and Libya in the first round. Madagascar was disqualified by CAF for non-payment of membership fee. Libya distinguished itself by qualifying to the first round because Mauritania withdrew and then withdrew without facing Tunisia – that is, Libya went 2 rounds without playing a single match. All too familiar in Africa, but the finals put a new twist: Egypt qualified to them and then decided to withdrew to prepare its national team better for the World Cup. Host Algeria protested to FIFA and FIFA forced Egypt to participate in the African finals – if not, Egypt was to be expelled from FIFA and thus from playing at the World Cup. Egypt sent a B team to the African finals. Cameroon, also mostly concerned with World Cup preparations took the African finals mostly as training phase and did not play seriously. So… the finals:
Group A – played in Algiers.
1.ALGERIA 3 3 0 0 10- 1 6
2.NIGERIA 3 2 0 1 3- 5 4
3.Ivory Coast 3 1 0 2 3- 5 2
4.Egypt 3 0 0 3 1- 6 0
Note that in the first group match Algeria destroyed Nigeria 5-1.
Group B – played in Annaba.
1.ZAMBIA 3 2 1 0 2- 0 5
2.SENEGAL 3 1 2 0 2- 0 4
3.Cameroon 3 1 0 2 2- 3 2
4.Kenya 3 0 1 2 0- 3 1
Semifinals
(Annaba)
12- 3-90 Zambia 0-2 Nigeria
[Okechukwu 18, Yekini 77]
(Algiers)
12- 3-90 Algeria 2-1 Senegal
[Menad 4, Amani 62; (og) 20]

Third Place Match (Algiers)
15- 3-90 Zambia 1-0 Senegal
[Chikabala 73]

Final (Algiers)
16- 3-90 Algeria 1-0 Nigeria
[Oudjani 38]
The final repeated the opening match of the finals, but there was big difference – the first time Algeria won easily 5-1. At the final they won again, but with difficulties, a minimal 1-0. Still, they won again.
Nigeria got silver and to a point it was the beginning of the big ascent of this country in the football world: the team was coached by Clemens Westerhof, the Dutch coach which led Nigeria to international significance. Only two players of the squad were based in Europe (Friday Elaho – Brondby, Denmark, and Andrew Use – KSV Roesoder, Belgium), but a good number of soon to be famous players were already at hand – Ben Iroha, Uche Okechukwu, Emmanuel Okocha, Rashidi Yekini, Daniel Amokachi. They still played at home, but very soon will play for much bigger European clubs than Brondby. It was steady rise of Nigerian football,which was perhaps the most stable in the continent – 3rd in 1976, 3rd in 1978, African champions in 1980, 2nd in 1984, 2nd in 1988. The only reason Nigerian football remained obscure outside Africa was that the country did not reach World Cup finals yet – but that was to change soon and how!

Algeria triumphed and their victory was rather expected: Algerian football was among the best in Africa, hosts of finals usually benefited not just from massive fan support, Egypt and Cameroon did not take the finals seriously, having in mind the coming World Cup, Tunisia and Morocco did not reach the finals, and Nigeria was already beaten with big result in the group stage, so Algeria had psychological advantage at the final too. And the squad, led by already famous Madjer was more experienced and professional than the Nigerians, who had plenty of talent, but lacked professional experience. Finally, it was a revenge for 1980 final, when Nigeria won 3-0 and won the title. This time Algeria came on top and triumphed for the first time as African champion.