Africa Cup of Nations 2019: 3 reasons why Algeria beat Guinea 3-0

#2 Algeria was unstoppable in the final third

Algerian players celebrate.

This is almost straightforward. Guinea had all of 13 shots at goal, Algeria had only 9. Guinea had only 1 shot on target, leaving a wayward 12. Algeria had five shots on target from nine, and they scored three. That singularly defines just how clinical the Desert Foxes were in front of goal.

In terms of dribbles, Guinea only got away with six dribbles, while Algeria had all of eighteen dribbles during the game, with Ismail Bennacer getting more dribbles than all of Guinea's team put together.

Algeria's low number of eight key passes shows just how decisive they were in front of goal. Nearly every key pass led to a shot on target, and nearly every shot on target led to a goal. Guinea may have had more key passes, but like their possession statistic, they wasted those passes and chances on goal.

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#1 Guinea was poor defensively

All three goals happened because of how poor the Guineans defended at certain times. While he conceded three goals, Kone deserves a lot of praise for keeping it at just three. Any lesser keeper in goal and Algeria would have walked away with 5 goals.

The first goal happened because of a static defence that couldn't mark or even monitor a marauding attacker. The defender he ran past made no real effort in stopping him. The second goal had Mahrez entirely free and capable of breezing past one lone defender with loads of space to spare. The third goal came from a cross that should have been tackled down, but no defender seemed sure of themselves on getting to the ball.

This, however, does not demote the quality with which the Algerians played. They had a solid game, and it is only to the detriment of Guinea fans that their own team had a horrid game.