The 2006 African Women's Championship was the seventh edition of the

African Women's Championship The Women's Africa Cup of Nations, also called the TotalEnergies Women's Africa Cup of Nations for sponsorship reasons and abbreviated to WAFCON, is an international women's football competition held every two years and sanctioned by the Confe ...

(now known as the ''Africa Women Cup of Nations''), the biennial international

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

championship organised by the

Confederation of African Football The Confederation of African Football, or CAF for short (french: link=yes, Confédération Africaine de Football, ar, link=yes, الاتحاد الأفريقي لكرة القدم, al-Ittiḥād al-Afrīqī li-Kurat al-Qadam), is the administ ...

(CAF) for the women's national teams of Africa. It was held in

Nigeria Nigeria ( ), , ig, Naìjíríyà, yo, Nàìjíríà, pcm, Naijá , ff, Naajeeriya, kcg, Naijeriya officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf o ...

between 28 October and 11 November 2006. The tournament was originally scheduled to be held in

Gabon Gabon (; ; snq, Ngabu), officially the Gabonese Republic (french: République gabonaise), is a country on the west coast of Central Africa. Located on the equator, it is bordered by Equatorial Guinea to the northwest, Cameroon to the north ...

, but the country withdrew from hosting the competition due to ''organisational reasons''. The CAF awarded the hosting of the competition to

in May 2006. Initially, the tournament was scheduled for September 2006, but it was moved to October due to weather considerations. The tournament determined the CAF's two qualifiers for the

2007 FIFA Women's World Cup The 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup, the fifth edition of the FIFA Women's World Cup, was an international association football competition for women held in China from 10 to 30 September 2007. Originally, China was to host the 2003 edition, but th ...

— the winner

and the runner-up

Ghana Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sharing borders with Ivory Coast in the west, Burkina Faso in the north, and To ...

. Nigeria won its seventh consecutive title, beating Ghana 1–0 in the final. South African Portia Modise was named player of the championship.

Qualification

qualified automatically as hosts, while the remaining seven spots were determined by the qualifying rounds, which took place from March to August 2006. Before Gabon's withdrawal,

entered qualification and was scheduled to play

Equatorial Guinea Equatorial Guinea ( es, Guinea Ecuatorial; french: Guinée équatoriale; pt, Guiné Equatorial), officially the Republic of Equatorial Guinea ( es, link=no, República de Guinea Ecuatorial, french: link=no, République de Guinée équatoria ...

in the second round. After CAF elected Nigeria as replacement hosts, the match was called off and both teams qualified for the final tournament.

did not retain its automatic qualification and therefore, was excluded from the tournament.

Format

Qualification ties were played on a home-and-away

two-legged In sports (particularly association football), a two-legged tie is a contest between two teams which comprises two matches or "legs", with each team as the home team in one leg. The winning team is usually determined by aggregate score, the sum o ...

basis. If the aggregate score was tied after the second leg, the

away goals rule The away goals rule is a method of tiebreaker, tiebreaking in association football and other sports when teams play each other twice, once at each team's home ground. Under the away goals rule, if the total goals scored by each team are equal, the ...

would be applied, and if still level, the

penalty shoot-out The penalty shootout is a method of determining a winner in sports matches that would have otherwise been drawn or tied. The rules for penalty shootouts vary between sports and even different competitions; however, the usual form is similar to pen ...

would be used to determine the winner (no

extra time Overtime or extra time is an additional period of play specified under the rules of a sport to bring a game to a decision and avoid declaring the match a tie or draw where the scores are the same. In some sports, this extra period is played onl ...

would be played). The seven winners of the final round qualified for the final tournament.

Qualified teams

2006 African Womens Football Championship qualification

appeared for the first time in the tournament. :

¹ Bold indicates champions for that year. ''Italic'' indicates hosts for that year.

Final tournament

First round

The finals took place in

Warri The city of Warri is an oil hub within South-South Nigeria and houses an annex of the Delta State Government House. Warri City is one of the major hubs of the petroleum industry in Nigeria. Warri and her twin city, Uvwie are the commercial c ...

Warri Township Stadium Warri Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium in Warri, Nigeria on Cemetery Road. It is currently used mostly for football matches and is the regular home of former Warri Wolves F.C. The stadium hosted the final tournament for the 2006 Women's African ...

. There was two groups, A and B, with a semi-finals and finals.

Group A

Equatorial Guinea arrived at Murtala Mohammed Airport in a private chartered plane, which did not have clearance to land. The players were not allowed to disembark for three hours, and despite organising officials trying to remedy the situation, the Equatorial Guinea players apparently left for home, unhappy with the treatment they received by airport officials.E/Guinea Flies into Trouble, Return to Malabo
, from thisdayonline.com, retrieved 29 October 2006 However, their first match went ahead on time. ---- ---- ---- ---- ----

Group B

---- ---- ---- ---- ----

Semi-finals

Winners qualified for the

. ----

Third place match

Final match

25,000 people watched the match, which was described by the BBC as "a drab encounter".

Awards

References and notes

External links

Tables & results
at RSSSF.com
Tables & results
at BBC.co.uk {{2007 FIFA Women's World Cup qualification