{"id":21569,"date":"2025-12-23T16:52:52","date_gmt":"2025-12-23T14:52:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jhb-webdevelopers\/channelafrica\/news\/drc-dominate-but-only-beat-benin-1-0\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T16:32:36","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T14:32:36","slug":"drc-dominate-but-only-beat-benin-1-0","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/drc-dominate-but-only-beat-benin-1-0\/","title":{"rendered":"DRC dominate but only beat Benin 1-0"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"x_x_ms-outlook-mobile-body-separator-line\">\n<div data-olk-copy-source=\"MessageBody\">The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) \u00a0got their Africa Cup of Nations finals campaign off to a winning start this Tuesday with a dominant performance against Benin, although they only won Group D\u2019s opening game 1-0.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"x_x_ms-outlook-mobile-signature\">\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Theo Bongonda netted the goal in the 16th minute, letting a long pass from defence bounce and reacting quickest as the Benin defence hesitated to volley the ball into the net.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>He might have had a second 13 minutes later, side-footing towards the corner of the net but seeing his goalbound effort blocked by defender Olivier Verdon.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The DRC , twice continental champions, did have the ball in the net two minutes into the second half as Cedric Bakambu easily headed home a pinpoint cross from Nathanael Mbuku, but after a lengthy VAR check it was ruled offside.<\/div>\n<div>Bakambu also had a breakaway opportunity midway through the second half after a clever pull-down and burst through the middle but saw his effort deflected away for a corner.<\/div>\n<div>Benin won a free kick in the 67th minute that Tamimou Ouorou blasted off target but spent most of the match defending before a breakaway in the last minute saw Aiyegun Tosin a whisker away from the equaliser as Congo goalkeeper Lionel Mpasi managed to keep the ball out.<\/div>\n<div>Benin are making their fifth appearance at the finals, but are still to win a match with five draws and 10 defeats since their 2004 debut.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The DRC come into the Cup of Nations on the back of having won Africa\u2019s World Cup playoffs in Morocco last month, earning a place in March\u2019s inter-confederation playoff in Mexico, where they will need to beat Jamaica or New Caledonia to qualify for the World Cup.<\/div>\n<div>Cup of Nations action continues on Tuesday with Senegal taking on Botswana in Tangier in the second Group D clash, followed by Group C fixtures between Nigeria and Tanzania in Fes and Tunisia and Uganda in Rabat.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">Groups E and F get underway on Wednesday before a break for all the Cup of Nations squads on Christmas.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":21509,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-21569","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Theo Bongonda netted the goal in the 16th minute.","published_date":null,"news_description":"Theo Bongonda netted the goal in the 16th minute.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/21569","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/21569\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25190,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/21569\/revisions\/25190"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=21569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}