Let’s face it – we watching football to see goals. Yes, there have been many stimulating goalless draws down the years and yes, the number of goals doesn’t necessarily correspond to the quality of football of offer. But we at Mozzart Sport Kenya are a bit old-fashioned – just give us some goals!After the first matchday, the tally of 12 goals in as many matches wasn’t enough to get the pulses of goal fiends racing. The long wait for the tournament to get underway must have done its part in making the players overly nervous and careful. We already spoke about the AFCON being a ‘binary tournament’ because a depressing majority of matches early on had scorelines of 1-0. Thankfully, things changed before long!There were 12 goals in the first round of #AFCON2021 games…‘AFCON is boring’There have been 29 in the second round – and the defending champions haven’t scored any yet.Bring on the final group games. pic.twitter.com/jiX9Bd3Vn7— Joe Crann (@YesWeCrann) January 16, 2022 It was the Cameroon v Ethiopia game that broke the 11-games-long string of “binary” games. The 4-1 win in Yaounde gave us hope that attackers haven’t forgotten their shooting boots at home. And it’s the hosts who’ve seen the most goals in their matches so far – eight in total. The Indomitable Lions captain Vincent Aboubakar i’s the tournament’s leading scorer with four goals – two of which came from the spot against Burkina Faso on the first day.The second matchday saw a pleasing total of 29 goals in 12 matches – now that’s more like it! Those goals have seen the average climb up to a respectable 1.71 goals per match – though it’s still lower than the average of the 2019 edition.Monday, 19.00: (7.50) Cape Verde (3.70) Cameroon (1.60)The old football saying states that you have to shoot to score. But it’s also important to make your shots count – and not just shoot for the sake of it. There were almost as many shots on goal in the first and the second matchday – but the shot conversion rate had more than doubled. Thank heavens!AFCON title-holders with their backs to the wall: What do Algeria need to survive?Perhaps the most disappointing teams in terms of goas have been Algeria and Senegal. Two of the teams that were mentioned as favourites to lift the trophy have struggled badly, scoring just one goal between them in their four matches so far. And that one has been a late Sadio Mane penalty.We expect and demand more goals from all teams. We’ve waited for a long time for this tournament and we want fireworks!
