Equatorial Guinea's Emilio Nsue Outshining Star Names At Cup Of Nations

Victor Osimhen, Mohamed Salah or Sadio Mane were perhaps the most likely bets to be top marksman at this year's Africa Cup of Nations, but the entirely unexpected name leading the scorers' charts in Ivory Coast has more goals than all of them combined. Emilio Nsue, the captain of unfancied Equatorial Guinea, goes into a last-16 tie with Guinea on Sunday after netting five times in the group stage. If he keeps this up, he could break Ndaye Mulamba's record of nine in one AFCON for Zaire in 1974.

"I am ambitious, but to be honest I would sign a contract right now if it said I would be the top scorer," he smiled when that record was mentioned to him in an interview with AFP in Abidjan.

Nsue scored twice in a 4-0 win over the hosts in their final group game, having netted three in a 4-2 win over Guinea-Bissau, the first Cup of Nations hat-trick since 2008.

Ranked 18th in Africa, Equatorial Guinea -- population 1.7 million -- is no footballing hotbed.

But the Central African nation has made remarkable progress over the last decade, spurred on by hosting the AFCON in 2012 and again in 2015, when they reached the semi-finals.

'Strongest in all Africa'

The current side, under softly-spoken coach Juan Micha, is undefeated since June 2022.

"The most important thing, our strong point, is the group, because we are playing almost eight or nine years together, so we are brothers," Nsue said.

"We don't have any superstar, but as a group I think we are the strongest in all Africa."

Nsue is certainly the closest thing they have to a superstar.

Born in Mallorca, he was in a Spain squad that won the Under-21 Euro in 2011 alongside David de Gea, Juan Mata and Thiago Alcantara.

But he opted to represent the country of his father's birth at