Guinea

Guinea 2007-08 Home
Guinea 2017 Home
Guinea 2021 Home, matchprepared v Turkey

Airness are a strange company, football seems to attract such companies. They tend to be reluctant to sell, but make some great designs. For all that this is a template, it is no exception, with the stripe along the front, in the collar and the short one on the right sleeve customised for the nations that wore it. Here we have the Guinean flag, lining up beautifully with the FA logo. Everything bar the logo is sublimated and there’s not much more to talk about, but it works really well. The only real oddity is that the sleeves feel a little longer and narrower than short sleeves traditionally would.

The shirt was mainly used in the 2008 AFCON qualifiers where their opponents were Algeria, Cape Verde and the Gambia. A poor start, with a draw against Algeria and a loss to Cape Verde was followed up by 3 wins from 4 games (drawing at home to the Gambia but otherwise not conceding) to take home the group and qualify, 3 points and 7 goals clear.

Next up we have this effort by Sindio and it is a good one. Fully sublimated is a bit of a shame but the design around the collar and sleeve cuffs is lovely. The front may appear to have only some slight bands of different shades but there’s also a subtle winding pattern across the bottom of the shirt (front and rear!) that really helps add to it. To add a brief splash of colour, there’s also the flag colours in a quick slash to the bottom left of the front of the shirt.

Nice though the design was, it only saw use at the 2017 Francophone Games where Guinea came agonisingly close to the knockout stages. They edged the Ivory Coast 3-2, managed 2-1 over Lebanon but lost 2-1 to Burkina Faso. This left them on 6 points, behind the Ivory Coast on goal difference by a solitary goal.

Lastly we come to a rare supplier in Masita. The Dutch company tended to vary their Guinea shirts a lot, with these early designs having the flag around the collar and dominating the front with the elephant design. Actually works pretty well and is nicely dramatic. However, the rear of the shirt tries a little too hard to look interesting (unlike many shirts where the rear is blank) and tiles a few dozen elephants of exactly the same design all across the back, except for the sleeves. Makes it look very strange, almost like a pair of pyjamas, less sure on that one.

Primarily used across 2022 qualifiers, Guinea didn’t fare spectacularly well. Drawn in a group with Morocco, Guinea-Bissau and Sudan, it was never going to be an easy time and Morocco were definitely the favourites. However, they would have expected to try and fight for that top spot. In actuality they struggled immensely, finishing 3^rd in a draw heavy group, on 4 points without a single win to their name. Morocco romped home on 18 points, beating Guinea home and away by 4 clear goals, leaving them to draw every other match.

The earlier shirts tend to sum up Guinea, they can be very impressive but tend not to make the leap.  They’ve been to 13 African Cup of Nations, finishing 2^nd in 1976 but mainly alternating between the group stages and knockout stages since. There also tends to be gaps in between qualifications for them, with three consecutive qualifications across 2004-08 being their only streak. This lack of ability to break into the top few teams in Africa has cost them in World Cup qualifiers, with them coming close in 1998 and 2006 in particular (1 point off Nigeria in 1998, 4 points off Tunisia in 2006 after 10 games) but many of their results have been middling. In other competitions they have a 2^nd place at the 1973 African Games and 3 CHAN qualifications have led to a 4^th and a 3^rd place.

On the women’s side Guinea have been more consistent than many of their counterparts. Far from perfect in that regard, they have tried to qualify for 7 women’s AFCONs and even participated in the 1991 finals, having been invited. Results have been very poor, with 1 goal scored and 71 conceded from their first 10 competitive games, though they have since beaten Mali and Sierra Leone. Things have improved since but their game time has become patchy. Men’s youth football has brought some strong success for Guinea, with 9 U20 AFCON appearances leading to a 2^nd place, a 3^rd place and a semi-final appearance along with 7 U17 AFCON appearances with three 3^rd place finishes and a 2^nd. These results have led to two U20 and five U17 World Cups, though their sole knockout stage appearance came in a 4^th place finish at the 1985 U17 World Cup. They’ve only played 3 qualification attempts at women’s youth level, never scoring or progressing to date, with the U20s attempting in 2008 and 2018 and the U17s in 2008.

Guinea have been much quieter on the alternative format front. They’ve never played any beach soccer and only showed up in futsal for 2020. The team qualified by walkover over Cape Verde and finished 3^rd in their group. They comfortably beat Mozambique but lost to Angola and heavily to Egypt.

Guinea didn’t have any easy route to the 2022 World Cup play-offs. Their youth performances were good, Morocco had been in shaky form, but their failure to win even a single match coupled with comfortable Moroccan victories meant top spot was well out of sight. One to forget for Syli National.