Football
Exclusive: Stefano Cusin Talks About Comoros Exploits and their AFCON Ambitions
Stefano Cusin discusses Comoros' recent historic win against Tunisia in AFCON preliminaries, emphasizing the team's focus on balance, tactics, and building a strong mentality. Cusin shares insights on the French connection within the squad and his tactical vision to elevate Comoros football on the African stage.
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What's the fuss about Comoros, one could ask? You might not have watched, but if you look around, you easily could find clips of dazzling Troyes wide man, Rafiki Said arriving just inside the box on time to beat Esperence goalie Aman Memmiche with a finely-placed effort on match day three of the AFCON preliminaries.
Advantage Comoros courtesy of that goal in Radès of all places and Les Coelacantes has raised eyebrows in the most provocative of ways.
Not just that the 1-0 'historic' result proved crucial during the international hostilities, with the return leg of that double-header seeing them hold on for 1-1, the Moon Islands has thrown down a gauntlet defeating one of the biggest oppositions in African football.
You have to go as far back as July 2010 to the last time Tunisia lost a game at home at this stage of the AFCON rounds, a record which stood for 14 years. For a squad valued well under €20 million, this could just be the start.
A historic Achievement
Speaking on their exploits which have seen them distinguish themselves in their bid to qualify for major competitions, Stefano noted the significance of the victory in Tunisia.
"Everyone knows it is historic, but we are building a team for the future", the former Wolves assistant manager told SportsBoom.com. "The results are important but most important is to build the mentality of the players."
Until now we didn’t make nothing, the most difficult games are coming and we are going to see if we are really improving.
Stefano Cusin
Talking Tactics
"I think the first quality of a winning team is to have a good balance, to be very strong defensively."
"In the striking positions, you need good strikers, offensively aware players who know with two, three passes where the final ball is going to arrive to them."
"This is very important, very important to how we tactically set up to play. Being Italian, I tend to demand a lot from the players tactically. For us, it is very important to have a good balance in the team."
The French-Connection
A look through the Comoros squad showed a majority of their players ply their trade in the divisions in France, a perspective which Stefan was quizzed on.
France is a ground well-known to nurture crude talents, so make no mistake about the capabilities of the modest Comorians.
"Yes, of course most of the players grew up in France and it's normal when you see them play the way they do", he said.
They've had that grooming with their first professional clubs, so the french background is one that offers them a good start even, you know.
Stefano Cusin
Time Constraint, But mentality Can Always be Improved on
"Coming to the national team, it could take too much time to get some of them up to speed and prepare for a game, a period of four, five days."
"So you have to manage best for a game. Maybe you can not improve them technically within that short time, but you can do well to improve them tactically and mentally."
"Getting to the World Cup? Let's not get ahead of ourselves. You look at the standings now and you can easily say we have a chance, but it is a long way. All the same, we are at work."
"We can only look back and savour it when we have it in the bag. Just like I already said, it is work, work work for now."
Since he broke loose from the shackles of long hours huddled up in a hot classroom learning Mandarin Chinese and Pinyin at the famous Confucius Institute, UNIZIK, Emmanuel Chinaza has embraced sports and football in particular, and it helped that he grew up in the football-crazy city of Anambra.