Eritrea's Shimungus & Angola's Flavio meet again in Asmara.

Yes! Angola scored 6 goals to Eritrea's one during the first round game between the two nations in March at Luanda. The Red Sea boys were in the game for the most part until the 30 minutes mark when they started to show signs of weakness. May be something was on the minds of some members of the team at that time.

This weekend when the Angolans head to Asmara, Eritrea they will have to think twice even though they are the favorites. Eritrea's record on home turf is not too bad. They have tied teams like Cameroon and Nigeria in the past along with upsets against Mozambique.

Angola may have a star in Flavio who makes his living playing in the Egyptian first division but Eritrea has a hard working young veteran player in Yidnekatchew Shimangus. This game is very important for Eritrea while Angola can still advance by winning the division that they are leading comfortably. Kenya will be taking on Swaziland in the other group game. Eritrea has beaten Kenya in Nairobi and tied Swaziland. So what now for Eritrea?

By beating Angola, Eritrea's RedSea boyz can exceed their chances at advancing comfortably as a second place team if they beat both Kenya and Swaziland in their next two games. There are many positive things going for the Eritrean team, like playing in a newly refurbished turf stadium at Chichero, playing in front of the home crowd, and adding players that were not a part of the team that lost in Luanda.

For the past few years looking at the Eritrean national team, there has been one player that has left his mark and has been consistent throughout the ups and downs . He plays smart and is physically fit to go through many great defenders. Add to his experience and I think come this weekend he will be the difference against Angola.

Yidnekatchew Shimungus has been nothing but spectacular and with a few players to help him out Eritrea's chances at home will be better than before. Flavio may be abig star and Angola might have been a world cup contender that beat Eritrea convincingly, but I believe if Eritrea gets its act together and plays with confidence, The Red Sea boyz might just get that sweet victory they so deserve in the land of Yikealos. Last week the Eritrean national team beat a strong Sudanese team by the score 1-0 and then tied them again 1-1. This shows that they can play back to back games without any problem. Both games can also be an advantage since they can serve as a pre-match warm up that the Eritrean national teams must continue to engage in in the future.

Good luck and hope to hear a great result.

The best 2nd place finsh in Manchester, England.

Despite finishing second @ the BUPA Great Manchester Run champions on Sunday morning, Eritrean runner and defending champion Zeresenai Tadesse should be proud of his accomplishments. Zeresenai fought hard and stayed neck to neck with the winner of the event

Eri-Olympic Medalist Zeresenai Tadesse pictured here getting his Bronze in Athens.

Micah Kogo who broke a UK All-Comers' 10 kilometres record held by Haile Ghebreslassie. The good news for Zersenai is that he also broke Ghebreslassie's record and surpassed his performance last year when he won the event. As far as Zeresenai is concerned he should be
proud of his result for two reasons. He beat an old record while he also made a tremendous improvement from his victory last year of 27:36, by 12 seconds (27:24).

Kogo who is considered the world's fastest 10k man this year with his 27minutes 7seconds display this past April in the small Dutch village of Brunsuum decided to take off at about the 5k mark. This is what he had to say after his big win,

"At 5K I decided to test everyone and then at 8K, decided it was the right place to make a long run for home which paid off."

Meanwhile Zeresenai continued to chase Kogo and in the end failed short by three seconds while he broke Ghebreslassie's record by one second putting him in the elite of the 10K running stars of the world.

Kogo acknowledged that the battle was not easily won as Tadesse and Mo Farah a Brit-Somalian finished in third place. Kogo said: "That was hard and it was good to win against such a strong field. It is fantastic for me to break Gebrselassie's record.

For Zeresenai this is successful run is one of many that continues to make him a star and a very special star at that. He has represented Eritrea very well in everything that he has done. With the amount of events he has been participating in alone this year, 2nd place is not so bad especially when you break a record.

Congratulations to Zeresenai Tadesse.

Eritrean-Swede Henok Goitom dominates Spanish 2nd division

Born in Sweden to Eritrean parents, Henok Goitom is slowly becoming a big star in Europe. Henok is currently playing in Spain. The Eritrean soccer player who plays in the Spanish second division Ciudad de Murcia scored 3 Goals against Alaves. So far this season Henok has scored14 goals.

Division 1 Spanish teams have shown their interest as he has shown brilliance on and off the field. Henok is also being touted by other European teams including teams from the English Premiership. Henok is being considered the next Henrik Larsson in his adopted homeland of Sweden. Some even argue that he is a much better player at his age and very fast and dangerous with his feet as well as on the air. That's for time to judge

A YOU TUBE link with video of one of his brilliant goal says it all. This goal in my opinion is as good if not better than Messi's Maradona look a like goal that was talk of the international sports scene just a few weeks ago. The only slight difference is this was a second division Spanish league game.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vss4Y7wR5es&mode=related&search=

You be the judge. All youth should work hard and use Henok as an example to shine in the game and life in general. To the Eritrean youth groups all over Europe, I want to say thank you for all that you do. I know Henok was active in the Eritrean youth group in Sweden and I want to ask all other youth groups to work hard to imulate hard working individuals like Henok.

Here is the link again. Just take a look and analyze it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vss4Y7wR5es&mode=related&search=