24 January 2005
Lagos — -Egypt meet Benin
Defending champions Egypt and Morocco qualified from Group B for the semi-finals of the African Youth Championship in Benin yesterday. Morocco edged out Angola 1-0 at the Rene Pleven Stadium while on the other side of Cotonou, Egypt easily beat Lesotho 4-1 at the Friendship Stadium.
The Egyptians raced into a two goal lead in the opening 12 minutes of their match.
Abdalllah Abdou opened the scoring in the seventh minute and Ahmed Farag doubled the lead just five minutes later.
The other three goals of the match all came in the final fifteen minutes of the second-half.
Abdallah Mohammed extended Egpyt's lead to 3-0 in the 75th minute before Mahmoud Alla Fadl put the game beyond doubt with an 82nd minute strike.
Lesotho got a late consolation through a penalty converted by Lintho Korie.
Morocco secured their semi-final place with their narrow win over Angola as Mouhssine Iajour grabbed the only goal of the game in the 39th minute.
The results mean that Egypt win Group B thanks to a better goal difference over Morocco with both sides on seven points from their three matches.
Lesotho, who were playing in their first ever continental finals, finished third in the group with three points while the Angolans return home without securing a single point.
In Wednesday's semi-finals Egypt face Group A runners-up Benin while Morocco face Group A winners Nigeria, who have won all their matches the tournament so far.
All four semi-finalists automatically qualify for FIFA's World Youth Championships in Holland in June.
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