Host country Rwanda Champions Ethiopia (2nd title) Third place Rwanda (A) | Dates 8 – 22 December Runners-up Kenya | |
Teams 11 (from CECAFA confederations) | ||
The 2001 CECAFA Cup was the 25th edition of the football tournament that involves teams from East and Central Africa. The matches were played in Rwanda, who had last hosted the competition two years before, in 1999. All the matches at the tournament were played from 8 December 2001, when Rwanda beat Somalia, until the 22 December 2001, when both the final and third place play-off were hosted. Prior to the tournament, Sudan withdrew their participation, and as such were suspended from all CECAFA tournaments in the future on an indefinite basis. However, the suspension was lifted in time for the 2002 CECAFA Cup.
Contents
Eleven teams entered the tournament, two more than had competed at the previous edition. There were, however, only ten countries competing at the 2001 Cup, as the hosts, Rwanda, entered Rwanda (A) and Rwanda (B). The last time Rwanda had hosted the tournament, in 1999, they had similarly entered two teams: Rwanda (A) finished third, beating Burundi in the third place play-off, and Rwanda (B) won the competition, beating Kenya 3 - 1 in the final. There were similar fortunes at the 2001 CECAFA Cup for Rwanda, as both teams qualified from their groups in second place, the tournament's set-up meaning that the two Rwandan sides could compete in the final against each other if they progressed thus far, as both Ugandan sides did at the 2000 tournament. Although Tanzania and Uganda were both beaten in the quarter-finals by Rwanda in 2001, in the semi-finals both Rwanda sides lost to Ethiopia, and Kenya, the side Rwanda (A) had beaten in 1999 to clinch the title. The two Rwanda sides therefore met in the third place play-off in 2001, and after it finished 1 - 1 after normal time, Rwanda (A) won 5 - 3 in a penalty shoot out. The two teams in the final, Kenya and Ethiopia, both won their groups (group A and group C respectively). 2001 was a good year for Ethiopia, not only did they beat Kenya 2 - 1 in the CECAFA Cup final, but their under-20 team qualified for the Argentinian-held 2001 FIFA World Youth Championship, this was the first time Ethiopia had qualified for the event. When they did reach the final, Ethiopia had never lost a CECAFA Cup final having played one prior to the occasion, but to this day Ethiopia still have not lost when they have reached the final, an event which has occurred four times. Uganda's 10 - 1 demolition of Djibouti was the biggest winning margin in the CECAFA Cup's history.
Background
The CECAFA Cup is considered Africa's oldest football tournament, and involves teams from Central and Southern Africa. The tournament was originally named the Gossage Cup, contested by the four nations of Kenya, Uganda, Tanganyika (modern day Tanzania), and Zanzibar, running from 1929 until 1965. In 1967, this became the East and Central African Senior Challenge Cup, often shortened to simply the Challenge Cup, which was competed for five years, until 1971, before the CECAFA Cup was introduced in 1973. The 2000 champions were Uganda (A), in 2001 Uganda scraped through their group in the third and final qualifying position; they were 3 points behind Burundi and 6 behind Tanzzania, but they were then knocked out in the quarter-finals against Rwanda (A). The 2001 champions, Ethiopia, were knocked out in the 2000 semi-finals by Uganda (B), though beat Rwanda to achieve third place.
Participants
11 teams from 9 countries competed, four teams from the original tournament (excluding Tanganyika, which changed names and is currently called Tanzania), including all 8 nations who competed at the 2000 CECAFA Cup in addition to Tanzania and Zanzibar.
Group stage
The group stage began on 8 December and ended on 15 December with Group A's final match between Rwanda (A) and Kenya, and Group C's final match between Rwanda (B) and Ethiopia. At the end of the group stage, the teams who finished bottom of their group were eliminated, along with the team which finished in third and received the worst amount of points contrasted with the other teams finishing third in the other groups. Due to there being an odd number of teams, Group C contained one less team, with a total of three, and therefore a reduced schedule, hosting only three matches to Group A and B's six.