2004 African Cup of Nations

The 2004 African Cup of Nations was held from 24 January to 14 February 2004 in Tunisia. It was the 24th edition of the biennial international men's football championship of Africa, organized by the Confederation of African Football (CAF). Tunisia hosted the tournament for the third time, having previously done so in 1965 and 1994.

Tunisia won the title for the first time in its history, defeating Morocco 2–1 in the final. Nigeria secured third place with a 2–1 victory over Mali in the third-place match. Cameroon, the defending champions from the 2002 edition, were eliminated in the quarter-finals after a 2–1 loss to Nigeria.

A total of 32 matches were played, with 88 goals scored — an average of 2.75 goals per match. The tournament attracted a total attendance of 617,500, averaging 19,297 spectators per match. As in the 2002 edition, sixteen teams competed, beginning with a group stage of four groups of four teams each, followed by knockout rounds (quarter-finals, semi-finals, and final). Cameroon, as the title holder, and Tunisia, as the host nation, automatically qualified. The remaining fourteen teams secured their spots through a qualification phase held from 7 September 2002 to 6 July 2003. The tournament was hosted by Nokia.

The tournament's top scorers were Tunisia's Francileudo Santos, Cameroon's Patrick Mboma, Mali's Frédéric Kanouté, and Nigeria's Jay-Jay Okocha. Santos received the Golden Boot, as he played for the championship-winning team and did not receive any cards during the tournament. Okocha was named the Player of the Tournament. As champions, Tunisia qualified for the 2005 FIFA Confederations Cup in Germany as Africa's representative.

Host selection

Bids :

• Benin / Togo
• Malawi / Zambia
• Tunisia (selected as hosts)
• Zimbabwe

The right to host the 2004 edition was awarded to Tunisia on 4 September 2000 during a CAF Executive Committee meeting in Cairo, Egypt Four bids were submitted: Tunisia; Zimbabwe; a joint bid by Malawi and Zambia; and another joint bid by Benin and Togo, which was withdrawn on the day of the CAF meeting. This marked the third time Tunisia hosted the tournament, after previously organizing it in 1965 and 1994. Two years prior to the competition, an organizing committee (Comité d'organisation de la Coupe d'Afrique des Nations, or COCAN) was formed, chaired by Slim Chiboub, who had also led the organizing committee in 1994..

Voting results

Country	Votes
Template:Flagicon Tunisia	9
Template:Flagicon Zimbabwe	3
Template:Flagicon Malawi / Template:Flagicon Zambia	1
Template:Flagicon Benin / Template:Flagicon Togo	Withdrew
Total votes	13

Venues

		Tunis		Sousse
		Stade 7 November	Stade El Menzah	Stade Olympique de Sousse
		Capacity: 60,000	Capacity: 45,000	Capacity: 28,000
		File:Tunisia - Netherlands (Stade de Radès).jpg	File:Stade El Menzah.jpg	File:Stade olympique de Sousse.jpg
		Monastir	Sfax	Bizerte
		Stade Mustapha Ben Jannet	Stade Taïeb Mhiri	Stade 15 Octobre
		Capacity: 22,000	Capacity: 22,000	Capacity: 20,000
		File:Stade Mustapha-Ben-Jennet.jpg	File:Stade taieb mehiri.JPG	File:Stade de bizerte.jpg

Qualification

File:2004 ACN Qualifiers.png

  Qualified

  Failed to qualify

  Withdrew or did not enter

  Not part of CAF

Qualification for the tournament took place from 7 September 2002 to 6 July 2003. A total of 49 nations registered for the competition and were initially divided into 13 groups: 10 groups of four teams and 3 groups of three teams. However, Guinea-Bissau, São Tomé and Príncipe and Djibouti withdrew their participation before the start of qualifying, so the 13 groups involved 7 four-team groups and 6 three-team groups.

The winner of each group qualified for the final tournament in Tunisia, as well as the best of the second. Cameroon, as defending champion, and Tunisia, as host country, automatically qualified for the final phase of the competition. Benin, Rwanda and Zimbabwe managed to qualify for the first time, with Benin and Rwanda finishing top of their groups in the qualifiers in front of two former African champions, Sudan and Ghana. Zimbabwe qualified as the best runner-up.

Qualified teams

The following sixteen teams qualified for the tournament. Cameroon were the highest-ranked team under the January 2004 FIFA World Rankings (14th), while hosts Tunisia were ranked 45th.

Team	Method of qualification	Finals appearance	Last appearance	Previous best performance	FIFA ranking at start of event
Tunisia	Hosts	11th	2002	(1965, 1996)	45
Cameroon	Holders	13th	2002	(1984, 1988, 2000, 2002)	14
Nigeria	Group 1 winners	13th	2002	(1980, 1994)	35
Guinea	Group 2 winners	7th	1998	(1976)	102
Benin	Group 3 winners	1st	None		123
Burkina Faso	Group 4 winners	6th	2002	(1998)	72
Kenya	Group 5 winners	5th	1992	(1972, 1988, 1990, 1992)	76
Mali	Group 6 winners	4th	2002	(1972)	51
Morocco	Group 7 winners	12th	2002	(1976)	38
Senegal	Group 8 winners	9th	2002	(2002)	33
DR Congo	Group 9 winners	14th	2002	(1968, 1974)	54
Egypt	Group 10 winners	19th	2002	(1957, 1959, 1986, 1998)	32
South Africa	Group 11 winners	5th	2002	(1996)	36
Algeria	Group 12 winners	13th	2002	(1990)	63
Rwanda	Group 13 winners	1st	None		109
Zimbabwe	Group 6 runner-up	1st	None		49

Final draw

The draw took place on 20 September 2003 in Tunis. The sixteen teams were divided into four pots according to their performances in past Cup of Nations tournaments.

Pot 1	Pot 2	Pot 3	Pot 4
Tunisia (hosts) Cameroon (title holders) Nigeria Senegal	Mali South Africa Egypt DR Congo	Morocco Burkina Faso Algeria Guinea	Kenya Rwanda Benin Zimbabwe

Marketing

Sponsorship

On 20 September 2003, in Tunis, Nokia acquired from CAF the right to be the "title sponsor" of the 24th edition, and hence the tournament was referred to as the Nokia Africa Cup of Nations, Tunisia 2004.

Sponsors list

Title sponsor	Official sponsors	Regional sponsors
Nokia	Toyota Pepsi Henkel Western Union The Laughing Cow Glo	Tunisie Telecom Tunisair AGIL Délice Danone

Broadcasting

Territory	Channel
	Tunis 7
	Canal+
Template:Flagicon MENA	ART
Template:Flagicon Sub-Saharan Africa	LC 2 AFNEX

Symbols

Mascot

File:Afcon 2004 mascot.png

Nçayir, the official mascot of the competition.

The organizing committee ran a competition to design a mascot for the tournament. The chosen mascot was an eagle named Nçayir, wearing a red and white jersey, in reference to the colors of the Tunisian flag.

I sent my proposal by post without even giving my phone number. I just wanted to participate. One day, someone knocked on the door. To my great surprise, I learned that my mascot proposal had won the contest ! I then had to change a few details requested by the organizing committee.

— Template:Comma separated entries

Match ball

The official ball for the 2004 African Cup of Nations was the Adidas Fevernova. Designed two years earlier by Adidas for the 2002 FIFA World Cup held in South Korea and Japan, and the 2003 FIFA Women's World Cup held in the United States. The ball was reused during the 2004 African Cup of Nations.

Match officials

The following referees were chosen for the 2004 Africa Cup of Nations.

Referees

• Template:Flagicon Divine Evehe
• Template:Flagicon Abubakar Sharaf
• Template:Flagicon Jerome Damon
• Template:Flagicon Modou Sowe
• Template:Flagicon Tessama Hailemalek
• Template:Flagicon Falla N'Doye
• Template:Flagicon Mohamed Guezzaz
• Template:Flagicon Abdul Hakim Shelmani
• Template:Flagicon Essam Abdel-Fatah
• Template:Flagicon Lassina Paré
• Template:Flagicon Coffi Codjia
• Template:Flagicon Alain Hamer
• Template:Flagicon Eddy Maillet
• Template:Flagicon Koman Coulibaly
• Template:Flagicon Ali Bujsaim
• Template:Flagicon Hichem Guirat

Matches

The 16 national teams participating in the tournament together played a total of 32 matches ranging from group stage and progression matches to knockout matches, with teams eliminated through the various progressive stages.

Group stage

File:African Cup of Nations 2004.png

Result of teams participating in 2004 African Cup of Nations

  Champion

  Runner-up

  Third place

  Fourth place

  Quarter-finals

  Group stage

Teams highlighted in green progress to the quarter-finals.

All times local: CET (UTC+1)

Tiebreakers

Teams were ranked according to points (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss), and if tied on points, the following tiebreaking criteria were applied, in the order given, to determine the rankings (Regulations Article 74):

1. Points in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
2. Goal difference in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
3. Goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
4. If more than two teams were tied, and after applying all head-to-head criteria above, a subset of teams were still tied, all head-to-head criteria above were reapplied exclusively to this subset of teams;
5. Goal difference in all group matches;
6. Goals scored in all group matches;
7. Drawing of lots.

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Knockout stage

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Final

"Winning the tournament was the main priority of the people who hired me, but it wasn't mine."

—Tunisia coach Roger Lemerre's statement to the BBC Sport after winning the title.

During the final, on 14 February 2004 at Stade 7 November in Radès in front of 60,000 supporters, Tunisia got off to a good start with a lead 1–0 after four minutes with Mehdi Nafti crossing to Francileudo Santos, who scored his fourth goal of the tournament. At the end of the first half, Morocco equalised with a goal from Youssouf Hadji, with an assist from Youssef Mokhtari. Seven minutes into the second half, Tunisian striker Ziad Jaziri gave his country the lead again, after Moroccan keeper Khalid Fouhami fumbled a cross from Jose Clayton. The match ended 2–1, giving Tunisia their first African Cup of Nations title. Khaled Badra and Riadh Bouazizi lifted the trophy after receiving it from President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. In winning the title, the Eagles of Carthage became the 13th nation to be crowned African champions. Roger Lemerre also became the first coach to win two different continental tournaments after having previously won the UEFA Euro 2000 with France. Tunisia also were accorded the African National Team of the Year award from the Confederation of African Football. As champions, Tunisia qualified for the 2005 FIFA Confederations Cup in Germany, as a representative of African continent.Template:Footballbox

Awards

The following awards were given at the conclusion of the tournament:

Player of the Tournament

• Template:Fbicon Jay-Jay Okocha

Top Scorer

• Template:Fbicon Francileudo Santos (4 goals)

Team of the Tournament

The Confederation of African Football (CAF) selected the best players of the 2004 African Cup of Nations. This team was called the Ideal Team of the African Cup of Nations 2004 and consisted of:

Goalkeeper	Defenders	Midfielders	Forwards
Template:Fbicon Vincent Enyeama	Template:Fbicon Walid Regragui Template:Fbicon Khaled Badra Template:Fbicon Abdeslam Ouaddou Template:Fbicon Timothée Atouba	Template:Fbicon Karim Ziani Template:Fbicon Riadh Bouazizi Template:Fbicon Jay-Jay Okocha Template:Fbicon John Utaka	Template:Fbicon Frédéric Kanouté Template:Fbicon Youssouf Hadji

Prize money

Each of the four teams eliminated in the quarter-finals received a bonus of 61,000 euros for reaching this level of competition. The semi-finalists received 122,600 euros, the finalists 245,200 euros and the winner 280,000 euros. Compensation was also provided to help the various federations, calculated according to the length of each team's stay in Tunisia and based on a daily lump sum of 6 euros per player and coach.

Final position	Prize money
Champions	280,000 euros
Runners-up	245,200 euros
Semi-finalists	122,600 euros
Quarter-finalists	61,000 euros

See also

• 2003 Tunis Four Nations Tournament
• 2004 African Women's Championship
• Football in Tunisia

External links

• 2004 edition records and statistics at RSSSF