By Omar Jatta
The Gambian league champions: Gamtel FC have flown out to Morocco for their CAF Champions League bow against Olympique Khouribga in the firsrt leg of the preliminary rounds, with both teams vying for a place in the next round of the competition.
Gamtel, who had previously played in the CAF Confederation cup will take on the Moroccan League Cup winners, Khourigba on Friday, 12th February, 2016 at 19.00hrs GMT for the first of their two-legged tie and the return leg in Banjul will subsequetly follow in a fortnight time on Saturday 27th February, 2016.
The winner over the two legs will make it into the round of 16, as the initial 32 teams will get trimmed down to 16 and if Gamtel wins they will have to go past Tunisian side, Etoile Sahel in the round of 16 before joining the group stages.
The winners of the round of 16 ties will qualify for the Champions League group stage whilst the losers will enter the CAF Confederation Cup play-offs.
If Gamtel makes the group stage, they could face the likes of Uganda Vipers, Enyimba of Nigeria, Lioli of Lesotho and Vital’O of Burundi in the group stage which is set to be in April 2016.
But before then Tapha Manneh’s team will hope they could better their GFL league form when they take on the OCKs in Marrakesh this evening. They had a poor start to their title defence in the league this season, having already lost two games and drawn five out of their opening nine games, which left them languishing in eighth place on the league table with 11 points.
However, Manneh is in bullish mood, having completed his team’s prepartions at their trainnig base in Marrakesh and he’s confirmed to gamfootball.com, that they’ve done all their neccessary preparations ahead of the game this evening.
“We have completed all our prepations and trainings without sustaining any injuries, which is crucial” he said. Adding: “We did not have any problems since we’ve been in here and we are focussed on the game tomorrow, and hopefully we can take a positive result back to The Gambia.”
For the Moroccans, they will hope they can make the most of their home advantage to take some lead into the return leg in Banjul. They have also endured a diabolical start to the Botola Pro Maroc Telecom league campaign, currently sitting bottom of the table, having drawn four games and lost a staggering eight games with 13 points to Show for the 15 games played. That’s a very poor return and it led the sacking of former coach Youssef Lamrini. The team has since improved under the stewardship of the new coach Mohamed Ijjay, a local man who was also serving as the club’s school trainer.
The situation under Lamrini was certainly a difficult time for the club, forcing the club to act due to the lack of results, lack of trust and poor communication among players who suddenly shut on themselves. The appointment of Ijjay reinstalled some form of confidence in the group, and the public.
According Ijjay, who was speaking to their local media, they’ve got their match preparations out of the way after holding their training camp locally. Something he believes is critical for the players to be close to their families.
“We normally prepare away on the mainland but this time we stayed in Khouribga where the players were reunited with their families, which is a good thing for their mental balance” , said Ijjay
However, Ijjay admitted their technical team knows very little about their Gambian opponents, and one reason why Olympique Khouribga will not underestimate the Gambian team.
“We take Gamtel very seriously. They still remain one of the best Gambian teams, having won four successive domestic league cups (2010, 2011 , 2012 and 2013) and a league title in 2015.
“They currently occupied the eighth place in the championship with 11 points,” Ijjay added.
