Soccer 365’s football journalist Jerrad Peters takes your question on what happened to the Ivory Coast at the African Cup of Nations.

What happened to Ivory Coast at the Africa Cup of Nations?
-Jorey, Charleston

What troubles me is not Ivory Coast’s quick exit from the Africa Cup of Nations, but rather the mentality—held by many fans and perpetuated by a handful of know-nothing pundits—that the West African nation is somehow the standard-bearer of sub-Saharan African soccer.

I have no idea where this mindset came from, but it certainly didn’t originate in Africa. I suspect it has far more to do with European ignorance than anything else. Because we recognize many of Ivory Coast’s players from the Premier League, La Liga and Ligue 1, we tend to inflate their abilities. There’s not anything particularly wrong with this; it’s down to familiarity. But there are hundreds of quality players playing their soccer at African clubs or in the Middle East. Many of them are stars at their clubs—not bit players such as Aruna Dindane, Gervinho and Siaka Tiene.

Of course, there’s also the Drogba effect. The Chelsea forward is one of Africa’s best players of the past decade, and he plays for one of the more glamorous club sides in the world. Kolo Toure (Manchester City), Emmanuel Eboue (Arsenal), and Yaya Toure (Barcelona) play for big clubs as well, which makes it easy for many fans to follow the Ivory Coast national team.

Don’t get me wrong; this is a good thing. The more people following African soccer, the better. But knowing the names of a few famous players does not turn Ivory Coast into a soccer superforce. If anything, it detracts from the quality of African soccer in general.

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The record speaks for itself. Ivory Coast have won exactly one international title of note: the 1992 Africa Cup of Nations. Alain Gouamene, Guel and Sergi Maggi were the top players on that team, and they came out of nowhere. But for a trio of third-place finishes in previous tournaments, the country had never really registered on the international soccer map. It’s also worth noting that Ivory Coast won just a single match in normal time during the 1992 competition—a 3-0 trouncing of Algeria. From there, they drew Congo, beat Zambia in extra time, overcame Cameroon on penalties, and required penalties once again to upset Ghana in the final.

After another third-place finish in 1994, they failed to qualify for the semifinal round until 2006.

It was at that Cup of Nations—hosted by Egypt—that Ivory Coast found themselves among the tournament favorites for the first time. Drogba led the way in the Group Phase with two goals in wins over Morocco and Libya. He also scored the only goal in Ivory Coast’s semifinal win over Nigeria in Alexandria. But when the big match arrived, he and his teammates were found wanting, and lost to the hosts on penalties.

Two years later, they crashed out to Egypt again—this time in a semifinal. That loss was probably even more of a surprise than Sunday’s defeat to Algeria. In the run-up to the 2008 Cup of Nations in Ghana, most western pundits had installed Ivory Coast as the team to beat, despite the fact that Egypt were far and away the best side on paper. The Pharaoh’s trampled Les Elephants in Kumasi, and Ghana beat them 4-2 to claim third spot.

Mohamed Aboutrika and Hosny Abd Rabo were the stars of the competition—not Drogba and Yaya Toure. To observers of African soccer, this came as no surprise. Aboutrika had been the best player on the African continent for years, and journalist Gabriele Marcotti had once opined that he was “arguably the best footballer on earth not plying his trade in Europe or South America.”

Others could quite accurately say the same for Abd Rabo, Angola’s Flavio or Burkina Faso’s Moumouni Dagano. Playing for Chelsea does not make Drogba a better international player than Aboutrika. Yaya Toure is not a better holding midfielder than Abd Rabo because he plays for Barcelona. And Ivory Coast are not a better side than Egypt, Ghana or Algeria because many of their players are based in western Europe.

Their exit from the Cup of Nations was not astonishing. It did not come out of the blue. And come the 2010 World Cup, they’ll have no better chance of carrying the continental torch than Nigeria or Cameroon. Ivory Coast are not the best team from Africa. They’re merely the most fashionable.