Europe retain Meridian Cup

By Andrew Haslam in Kusadasi

Europe retained the UEFA-CAF Meridian Cup in Turkey, once again keeping a determined African challenge at bay.

Europeans unbeaten
The four European participants in the 2005 event - France, Spain, Portugal and the hosts - won 14 of their 16 matches over the last eight days. Only Egypt and Sierra Leone recorded points for the African continent - whose other representatives in the eight-team competition were Cameroon and Nigeria - both earning goalless draws against Portugal in the round-robin tournament. The overall result means that the trophy has stayed in Europe since 1999, when Spain won the final championship before it came a straight intercontinental challenge, with Nigeria the winners of the inaugural biennial event two years earlier.

Victorious captains
The four victorious European captains - Jérémy Menez of France, Spain's Francisco Javier García, Ugur Uçar of Turkey and Portugal's Bruno Gama - were presented with the Meridian Cup trophy at a ceremony at the Akadule Hotel, Kusadasi, on Friday evening. All eight teams received 25 medals each commemorating their participation in the event, with the captains of the four African sides also receiving a plaquette - Guy Toindouba collected the prize on behalf of Cameroon, Sherif Ashraf Okily for Egypt, Okemute Odah for Nigeria and Yusufu Kamara for Sierra Leone.

Illustrious speakers
At the ceremony, which included speeches by Jim Boyce, chairman of UEFA's Youth and Amateur Football Committee, Baba Sakho, the head of the CAF delegation, and Turkish Football Association president Dr Levent Biçakci, Turkey were handed the Fair Play award having finished with the best record of the eight teams.