{"id":14115,"date":"2013-01-30T13:08:00","date_gmt":"2013-01-30T13:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ghana-mma.com\/2013\/01\/afcon-2013-zambia-exit-my-fault-says-renard\/"},"modified":"2013-01-30T13:08:00","modified_gmt":"2013-01-30T13:08:00","slug":"afcon-2013-zambia-exit-my-fault-says-renard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2013\/01\/30\/afcon-2013-zambia-exit-my-fault-says-renard\/","title":{"rendered":"AFCON 2013: Zambia Exit My Fault, Says Renard"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"2210F01.Herve-Renard.jpg<\/div>\n
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Zambian Head coach, Herve Renard<\/strong><\/p>\n

BBC<\/p>\n

Head coach Herve Renard has said he is to blame for Zambia’s failure to reach the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations quarter-finals.<\/p>\n

The defending champions were eliminated after a 0-0 draw against Burkina Faso in their final Group C game on Tuesday, reports the BBC.<\/p>\n

“I loved my team tonight. If there is someone who is responsible then it’s me, not my players,” said Renard.<\/p>\n

While Zambia exited the competition, Burkina Faso celebrated a first second round qualification on foreign soil.<\/p>\n

Zambia’s one-year reign as champions is the shortest in the history of the tournament after the competition was switched to odd years after the 2012 edition<\/p>\n

The Chipolopolo claimed a shock tournament victory in last year’s event as they beat favourites Cote d\u2019Ivoire in a dramatic penalty shoot-out.<\/p>\n

But draws against Ethiopia, Nigeria and the Stallions saw the Super Eagles progress at their expense thanks to a brace of penalties from Victor Moses in their final fixture.<\/p>\n

The result ensured Zambia became the first holders to exit the competition at the group stage in 21 years.<\/p>\n

“It’s better to have won something in your life than always qualify for the quarter-finals, but never win anything,” said Frenchman Renard.<\/p>\n

“This is not the end of the world. Before we used to go home a lot of times after the first round, and today you have to accept that this is football.<\/p>\n

“Everybody is sad but my players did their maximum, and I’m very proud of them. It’s not the end of the world.”<\/p>\n

The stalemate with Zambia owed much to a dogged performance from Burkina Faso as they chose to flood the midfield and slow play down, a tactic coach Paul Put acknowledged after the game in colloquial fashion.<\/p>\n

“The ingredient for the day was more pepper than salt for the soup,” he said.<\/p>\n

Burkina Faso – who will now meet the runners up in Group D on Sunday – had only previously reached the last-eight of the competition when they were hosts in 1998, and Put praised his side for making “history” in South Africa.<\/p>\n

“I think it’s Burkina Faso’s biggest achievement because they hosted it one time and then they reached the semi-finals,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Our first target was to do better than in [more recent] African Cup of Nations, and we had already achieved that by drawing with Nigeria and beating Ethiopia. I think it’s history for Burkina Faso.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Zambian Head coach, Herve Renard BBC Head coach Herve Renard has said he is to blame for Zambia’s failure to reach the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations quarter-finals. The defending champions were eliminated after a 0-0 draw against Burkina Faso in their final Group C game on Tuesday, reports the BBC. …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14115\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}