After some thorough research the fanzine has discovered that unfortunately Mustapha Dumbuya did not feature for Sierra Leone in the African Cup of Nations 1st round match against Sao Tome & Principe at the weekend. The match, played in Freetown on Saturday, finished 4-2 to Sierra Leone, giving them a 5-4 win on aggregate, but further details on the game had been hard to come by following a media blackout of the match.
Journalists in Freetown had been told by the local government that they would have to pay to enter the stadium and cover the fixture; as such the Leone media duly elected to boycott the fixture meaning that the only information available to the wider world is the timing of the goals. However, thanks to a couple of friendly enquiries, and the wonder of Twitter, we’ve been able to ascertain from someone present at the match that unfortunately Mustapha Dumbuya did not make his long awaited debut for Sierra Leone.
From the bench or the stands Dumbuya will have seen the Islanders of Sao Tome & principe take a surprise lead after just thirty seconds of the game through Jair Nunes. However the Leone Stars hit back with four first half goals in a twenty-three minute spell; Kei Kamura and Ibrahim Bangura both scoring a brace to secure a 5-3 aggregate advantage at the break. Sao Tome pulled another goal back after the break through Jose da Silva Varela to set up a nervy end to the game, not helped when Kamara had a goal ruled out for offside with twenty minutes to go, but eventually Sierra Leone held on to secure a passage to the 2nd round.
Thanks to Steve of Mirko Bolesan for his help.
Hopefully, Dumbuya’s willingness to travel to Freetown and keeness to be involved in the international set-up will see him feature in Sierra Leone’s future internationals.
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