Cameroon memories.

Group   A

Cameroon   0           Croatia   4

                                          Olic (11)

                                          Perisic (48)

                                          Mandzukic (61, 73)

Cameroon bowed out of the tournament last night after an absolute demolition at the hands  Count Kovac's Croatia.  Croatia had their main striker Mandzukic back and he helped the Croatians on their way with with a second half brace.  Cameroon looked a sorry state. A first half sending off for Alex Song after some sort of attempted elbow made it even harder for the Africans to stay in the competition.  Croatia played well and took their chances, whereas the Cameroon showed very little in attack and ended up fighting amongst each other as the game and their own world cup hopes drew to an uninspiring end.

Its a shame that Cameroon are not the team they used to be. 

 Back in 1990 I had the pleasure of meeting a load of Cameroon fans in Naples.  Me and my mates had been staying in Cagliari to watch the England group games which had all been based there.  Cagliari is on an island off of the mainland.  With England qualifying for the knock out stage our next game was to be in Bologna which was right near the top of the country.  We decided we would get there the cheapest way possible which happened to be by ferry.  There were many ports we could dock in but we decided again mostly due to money issues that we would get the ferry to Naples.  

It was a couple of days before the England game was kicking off in Bologna and it would take ages to travel up there, so when we arrived in Naples at around midday we had already decided we were going to spend the day there.  The first thing we noticed as we entered the city was that it was full of Cameroon supporters, most of them in their shirts, blowing whistles and banging drums.  Their second round game was against Colombia which was being played in the San Paolo stadium at 5 pm.  We had had a few beers on the ferry over and we decided we would join the Cameroon and have a few drinks with them.   We got bollocksed, the blokes we were drinking with were on Guinness and Rum, I didn't fancy beer so I was on Pernod and black.  

About 3 o'clock most of the supporters started to leave, they were off to the stadium, anyway as everyone started leaving I managed to lose my mates and after a while I was left lost in the middle of Naples without a clue where I was.  I went back to the bar and couldn't find them anywhere, but just as I was about to get disconsolate, I saw something under the foot of one of the bar stools, on closer inspection I saw it was a ticket for that evenings game .  Fuck it I thought in for a penny, in for a pound.and off I went to the San Paolo stadium to watch Cameroon and Colombia.

After getting in the ground I soon realised I stuck out like a sore thumb.  There I was with my England shirt on bang in the middle of all these Cameroon supporters, I was a little tiny white speck in a massive sea of green.  What an atmosphere though, it was brilliant, the bloke next to me had a hip flask with some sort of alcohol in it which he kept sharing with me, I was already off my tits so by the time it got to kick off I had no clue.  It wasn't a great game but as I said the noise and party atmosphere made up for what was happening on the pitch, at one point someone put the drum round my neck and I was playing away as happy as Larry.

The game ended 0-0 in normal time and went in to extra time.  I was having such a good time and didn't want the game to end, I so wanted Cameroon to win.  Then in the first minute of the second half of extra time Samba dancing 48 year old Roger Milla gave Cameroon the lead, the place went mental I was jumping up and down, people were picking me up, it was unbelievable, then 3 minutes later as the crowd calmed down a bit, Colombian goalkeeper Rene Higuita came out of his area and started fucking about with the ball deep in his own half, Roger Milla promptly took the ball off him and ran towards an empty goal, as he ran the crowd began to lift of its feet, as they lifted  I was lifted high in the air, until finally Milla slots the ball into the net.  Its 2-0 to Cameroon and in the celebrations I have ended up on the pitch right near the corner flag Roger Milla is heading towards.  I don't really remember anything else as I was chucked out for being on the pitch. 

Colombia pulled a goal back but Cameroon won the game and met England in the quarter final.

Happy days, happy days indeed.