CAF AWCON: Liberia Begin Preparation to Face Senegal

Throwback: Liberia women's national football team at one of their past training sessions

Liberia’s senior women’s national football team commenced training on Wednesday, September 29, ahead of the 2022 CAF Women’s Cup of Nations qualifiers.

The female Lone Star are due to host the Lionesses of Senegal on October 20, in the first-leg before travelling to Dakar for the second leg. 

Led by Coach Robert Lartey, the team conducted their first session at the SKD mini-stadium.

Captain Jestina Wilson, Francisca Howe, Loretha Sackie, Lucy Kikeh, Hawa Kpan, Josephine Dennis and Jennis Tisdell were present at the first session.

Others include Kanties Sayee, Lucy Massaquoi, Albertee Lumbeh, Winnie Dorbah, Leda Johnson and goalkeepers Kormassa Sumo and Massa Konneh.

The commencement of the preparation comes two weeks after the Senegalese hosted Cape Verde in a back-to-back international friendly at the Jules Fran Oisois Bocandé Technical Center in Toubab Dialaw.

The friendly was in preparation for their upcoming match against Liberia.

Both Liberia and Senegal were paired during the draw of the tournament qualification series that saw a record of 45 member associations taking part in the qualifiers. Morocco, as the host country of the final tournament, automatically qualified for the hosts. A total of 44 teams will take part in the qualifiers.

The First Round of the qualifiers should have been played in June this year, but was postponed “As a result of the constraints posed by the COVID-19 pandemic in Africa and also infrastructure challenges in the continent,” CAF said. The last meeting between Liberia and Senegal was in March 2020, during the WAFU A women’s tournament. Senegal defeated Liberia 2-1 in the semifinals and eventually went on to win the tournament after beating Mali 3-0.

Liberia finished as 3rd place winners in the tournament.