Senegal's Exit in the Africa Cup Final: Morocco Staff Respond

I focused on avoiding any controversy. At this Africa Cup, they went and said, “Ah, the staff…”

Uh, why didn’t they leave the field too, who made Senegal leave? Why?”

You have to understand that this was a unique situation never seen in football history.

After our work, we went to the referee. We told him, “Send them off. You have to blow the whistle.”

He didn’t blow it. When Pape Thiaw started saying, “Guys, get out, get out,” we didn’t go over to tell him, “No, don’t tell them to leave.”

He takes responsibility for that, you understand?

Those are matters for Senegal. I’m not interested in them.

I’m looking at what we did as Moroccan coaches.

We took our players, and they say, “Ah, it was chaos.”

The chaos was all over the field. We tried to calm our players down and made them understand…

At some point, we brought them together.

The decision comes from the referee, From the referee, then the delegate, We did what we had to do.

Yeah, no, whatever you say, You didn't follow the Senegalese team and say, “Go back.” Why would we?

We understood. Why tell them? Maybe—We get why you'd tell him to go back.

Maybe a player, maybe he said to him: “What are you doing? Why? Hey, you came to play football, right?” You understand? In the end— Rachid was also seen going and— No, Rachid was the opposite. Rach—Rachid, when— when Pape Thiaw spoke, he told him:

“Do what you want, leave if you want,” We, we, uh, we, we were within our rights, you understand?

No, it wasn't like that, Uh, we didn't debate it for a whole hour, That's how the talk went, We stayed focused on our match, Honestly, in the end, The footage sometimes gives you images that, that are of that mess.

Our team is really going all out, First of all, This has never happened in fo— in football, in a final, never…