Cameroon, Serbia play out a 3-3 thriller

To put a lid on the Andre Onana controversy, Cameroon needed the kind of performance they produced against Serbia at Al Janoub Stadium where fortunes yo-yoed before the teams played a thrilling 3-3 draw. It is a result that meant Cameroon are not done with Doha yet.

Till after the hour mark, it looked like Samuel Eto’o assertion that Cameroon could go all the way was just a bombast of a federation president. They were trailing 1-3, Serbia having come back from Jean-Charles Castelletto’s 29th-minute tap-in with two goals in first-half stoppage time through Strahinja Pavlovic’s header in the 45+1 minute and Sergej Miliknovic-Savic (45+3). When Aleksander Mitrovic made it 3-1 in the 53rd minute after an exchange of passes in the rival penalty area, the Lions looked anything but Indomitable.

But substitute Vincent Aboubakar showed why they are called that, pulling one back in the 64th with an audacious lob. Got on to break the Serbian high line, Aboubakar, who plays for Al Nassr in Saudi Arabia, did that again in the 66th minute to set up Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting for the simplest of tap-ins. It stopped a run of seven successive World Cup defeats for Cameroon. “We took it too easy and made two huge mistakes in the defence,” said Serbia coach Drajan Stoijkov.

Making his World Cup debut, Devis Epassy, a goalkeeper who also plays in Saudi Arabia, kept Cameroon in the game with a 77th-minute block to deny Mitrovic. And again in the 87th minute calmly cutting out Filip Kostic’s delivery from the left. Mitrovic was marginally off-side in second-half stoppage time but Epassy took the shot on his face after the Serbian forward broke through.

Epassy was in because Onana was out of the squad following a difference of opinion with coach Rigobert Song. According to media reports, Song and Onana had a falling out at Saturday’s training session, the Ajax goalkeeper refusing to heed Song’s directive to hoof goalkicks and not play out from the back. Eto’o had tried to mediate but relations between player and coach had irretrievably broken down, the reports said.

Onana, 26, has served a drug ban, a 12-month sentence reduced to nine on appeal while at Ajax on whose rolls he was for six years. Onana moved to Inter Milan this season where he was the No.1 from October to the break before the World Cup. Onana’s absence at Ajax had given Maarten Stekelenburg’s career a second wind, the goalkeeper returning to the Holland side for the European championships last year.

“We are in a difficult tournament and the team is always above an individual. Andre wanted to step out and we accepted that,” said Song, a former defender who has played four World Cups with Cameroon.

“There are times when strong action needs to be taken. I took a risk and I accept responsibility for the decision. Today, Epassy showed he can be a competitor to one of the best goalkeepers in Europe. It is up to Andre whether he will respect the rules and stay.”

After Mitrovic hit the bar, Cameroon forged ahead following a corner kick with Castelletto tapping in a Choupo-Moting header flicked back. Among the Serbians that didn’t appeal for off-side was Milos Velkovic. The central defender had been caught ball watching and blindsided by Castelletto. The bellow that followed in the media tribune where Cameroon Radio and TV where doping live commentary conveyed that it was their finals goal since the 1-4 loss to Brazil in 2014.

Serbia too equalised from a set-piece. Dusan Tadic fired in the free kick in and as Choupo-Moting jumped early sandwiched between him and Andre-Frank Anguissa Zambo was Pavlovic who netted a powerful header. Zambo’s inability to get the ball out with a back-volley with two Serbians pressuring him led to the second goal where, maybe because he was unsighted, Epassy only got a hand to Miliknovic-Savic’a low drive. Mitrovic’s goal came when Cameroon were dispossessed and then Serbia played four passes, three in the penalty area. And then Cameroon showed lightning can strike twice in two minutes.

African teams have been in the news at World Cups for the wrong reasons, usually over players not being given bonuses promised. But they are also teams that have provided colour and some of the competition’s most memorable moments. Think Cameroon in 1990, Nigeria in 1994, Senegal in 2002, Ghana in 2010. And after Monday, Cameroon in 2022.

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