Ivory Coast And Burkina Faso Wins Their First Play-offs

The first two of the five World Cup play-offs for this weekend were played today Saturday, the 12th of October. The Stallions of Burkina Faso triumphed 3 - 2 against the visiting Algerian team in Ouagadougou, while the Elephants of Ivory Coast won 3 - 1 at home in Abidjan.

At the last minutes of the encounter between Burkina Faso and Algeria, the home team was awarded a controversial penalty by the Zambian referee, Janny Sikazwe, which was taken after a strong protest from the Algerian players.

The referee thought that the ball touched, Essaid Belkalem, even though he had his hands behind him, when the ball was strucked. Anyway, the Burkinabe striker, Aristide Bance, stepped up and took the penalty and scored the time that it mattered most for his team.

Didier Drogba

 He had earlier in the first half missed a penalty, so it was brave of him to have decided to take another one, that was at that juncture of the encounter worth millions of dollers. Luckily for him and the country, he did not miss this time around.

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After the match the Algeria's assistant coach, Nourredine Kourichi, said that, ''If we win the second leg 1 - 0, it will be enough. The second leg will be difficult for Burkina and for us as well but we are hopeful. We are optimistic.''

In the other match between the Elephants of Ivory Coast and the Terenge Lions of Senegal, the Ivorians scored an early goal through a penalty, by their experienced captain Didier Drogba.

 Their second goal was scored by the former Arsenal striker, who now plays for AS Roma, while Salomon Kalou, put the cherry on the cake when he added the third goal. Demba Cisse scored the Senegalese consolation goal.

After the match the Ivorian striker, Salomon kalou, said to BBC, ''We showed today that we can be a team. We scored early, which gave us the confidence to go forward and score more.

''I think it's a good victory. We can be positive about the next round because there is one more game to go, but we did one step and we have to fight to get the second one,'' he added.

The Elephants, are in a good position for the second leg, of the play-offs next month, but you never know with football, anything can happen. The aggregate winner of the two matches will go to the World Cup in Brazil.