Sierra Leone Senior National team Leone Stars has on 27th March 2022 defeated the Lone Stars of Liberia in a trial B international friendly match at the Mardan Stadium in Turkey.
Bolton Wanderers striker Amadou Bakayoko accounted for his first international goal in the 30th-minutes assisted by FC Johansen football club defender Lamin Conteh as Sierra Leone defeated Liberia in their first away win since June 2021 against Benin in Guinea.
Sierra Leone started the match at a paced start but they were not clinical in front of the goal at the start of the twenty minutes as they go close three times in getting the opener of the match.
Both Augustus Kargbo and Amadou Bakayoko nearly got the goals but the strong defensive works of the Liberian defensive work prevent the Leone Stars from getting the opening goals.
According to John Keister the head coach of the National team it was a difficult match because players were under immense pressure throughout the match, but he thinks that both players are in the same direction identifying players and working on the development of the national team.
“These matches are sometimes about helping us to identify players and not about results, although they are important, we do not too concerned about the results but sometimes is about putting things together and where we are going forward”,
He affirmed that friendly matches are important because they will help the national team to bring the young players trying to recruit more players ahead of the next Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers.
He noted that the three friendlies have given the technical team a lot of positive going forward to the qualifiers as Leone Stars are preparing for their group stages qualifiers which are going to start in June.
As the team is going through a transition and the younger players have given me better impression going forward.
Peter Butler the head coach of the Liberia national team said the friendly match is basically to test his players as they prepared for their next matches in the Africa Cup of Nations, even though they pushed to get the win but he added that they will now focus on Africa Nations Cup qualifiers in June.
Liberia lost their first match against Benin by four goals to nil while Sierra Leone lost to Togo by three goals to nil.
The Leone Stars of Sierra Leone will now face Congo Brazzaville on the 31st of March 2022.
