{"id":7894,"date":"2012-02-12T01:58:34","date_gmt":"2012-02-11T23:58:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/02\/soccer-zahoui-emerges-from-doubt-to-general-acclaim\/"},"modified":"2012-02-12T01:58:34","modified_gmt":"2012-02-11T23:58:34","slug":"soccer-zahoui-emerges-from-doubt-to-general-acclaim","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/soccer-zahoui-emerges-from-doubt-to-general-acclaim\/","title":{"rendered":"Soccer-Zahoui emerges from doubt to general acclaim"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>By Mark Gleeson<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"articleLocation\">LIBREVILLE<\/span> Feb 11 (Reuters) &#8211; Francois Zahoui has<br \/>\novercome self-doubts over his ability as coach of the Ivory<br \/>\nCoast to emerge with plaudits for his tactical acumen on the eve<br \/>\nof the African Nations Cup final against Zambia.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Relatively inexperienced when he succeeded Sven Goran<br \/>\nEriksson after the 2010 World Cup, Zahoui now stands on the<br \/>\nbrink of winning only a second Nations Cup title for his<br \/>\ncountry.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;At first I wondered whether I would be up to the job and<br \/>\nothers also doubted my capacity to take on the job but I knew<br \/>\nthat if I work serenely I could achieve my goals,&#8221; he told<br \/>\nreporters as the Ivorians prepared for their third final.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve a team of talented players, stars really, who have<br \/>\nworked under famous coaches at famous clubs. But they have<br \/>\nconfidence in me, I have a good relationship with them and we<br \/>\nhave a common goal to leave here at the top.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Early in the tournament, Zahoui made it clear that winning<br \/>\nwould be the top priority, even if his side had to grind out the<br \/>\nresults.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>It meant a usually expansive Ivorian approach was changed,<br \/>\nwith emphasis on defence first and little of the flamboyance<br \/>\nusually associated with the team.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>At first Zahoui was criticised but after reaching the final<br \/>\nby winning all five games without conceding a goal he is now<br \/>\nbeing hailed as astute.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Getting players to check their natural instinct and work<br \/>\ncollectively has been impressive,&#8221; says former African<br \/>\nFootballer of the Year Kalusha Bwalya, now president of the<br \/>\nZambian football association.<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Mark Gleeson LIBREVILLE Feb 11 (Reuters) &#8211; Francois Zahoui has overcome self-doubts over his ability as coach of the Ivory Coast to emerge with plaudits for his tactical acumen on the eve of the African Nations Cup final against Zambia. Relatively inexperienced when he succeeded Sven Goran Eriksson after the 2010 World Cup, Zahoui [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-7894","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7894","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7894"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7894\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7894"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7894"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7894"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}