A clash of African football giants, one on the rise, the other in decline is befitting description of today’s semi-final encounter between the Black Stars of Ghana and the Indomitable Lions of Cameroun. It is a clash between two of the power houses of the African game; each of them well endowed with the character and appetite for high honours. A four-time champions of Africa, both Ghana and Cameroun are used to the big stage and have produced generations of world-class footballers, almost with equal measure. With such awesome pedigree in African football, the two teams sharing eight of the 25 championship titles so far won, there is a reason why Ghana and Cameroun are meeting only for the 12th time in a 40-year history. Between 1963 and 1982 when Ghana amassed its four championship titles, the Indomitable Lions were no real force in the continental game. And from 1984, when Cameroun's dominance of African football began, it was not until 1992 that Ghana re-emerged at the Nations Cup stage during the finals in Senegal. By then Cameroun had won its second African championship (1984 and 1988), a signal of how the pendulum has been swinging - when one is on its way up, the other is on its way down. From that point of view, Ghana's coach, Claude Le Roy, has labelled today's clash a "difficult curve to negotiate" in a true presentation of what challenge confronts the two sides. It was a candid view expressed by the Frenchman, at least 24 hours before it dawned on him that the journey to the Nations Cup dreamland would not succeed without encountering the team that projected him into coaching limelight on the continent. "I know the semi-final curve is always difficult to negotiate," the Frenchman said after his team barely sealed its first semi-final berth since South Africa 1996 with a hard-fought 2-1 victory over Nigeria last Sunday. In fact, it was in acknowledgement particularly of his solitary Nations Cup success in Morocco 1988 where he guided the Indomitable Lions past the host nation with a 1-0 vjctory in Rabat. In Ghana 2008, Le Roy's Black Stars are playing host to Cameroun in just the 13th clash between the two sides in history and his fear of suffering the fate which he guided Cameroun to inflict on Morocco in 1988 has provided reason for his well-guided comments. Such is the situation in which Le Roy finds himself that in spite of the growing confidence in the team's camp, he has given little away by way of tactics. Confronted by the free-scoring Indomitable Lions, led by the prolific Samuel Eto'o, Le Roy could not have had a worse time in charge of a Nations Cup campaign, as he now has to work without his trusted but suspended central defender, skipper John Mensah, with doubts still hanging over Shilla Illiasu, despite official pronouncements that he is fit. If the condition in the Stars' camp is uncomfortable, comments by Cameroun coach, Otto Pfister, that he would paralyse the Stars tactically were a damning assessment of the quality the German faces in his French counterpart who knows Camerounian football just as much as Pfister is conversant with the Ghanaian game. But what he may find awkward is the role Michael Essien will assume in Ghana's game plan. The midfield general was graceful in defence for the last 30 minutes during which he filled the void John Mensah left when he was shown the red card in the match against Nigeria. Whether he returns to that position, or maintains his midfield role, Essien's influence on the Ghanaian team could be the factor to neutralise the presence of Eto'o, Geremi Njitap, Alexandre Song, Mbai, Desire Job and all who have ridden more on their famous glory days than on true current form. The credentials of Cameroun, who won the first of their four titles when Ghana had won all four of their then record four titles, will force a real difficult tie for a host nation pressurised by a "Host And Win" agenda to replicate the country's own feat in 1963 and 1978, as well as the few others that have followed, including Egypt's example in 2006. And Le Roy can force some smile ahead of the battle on account of Nations Cup revelation Anthony Annan's form and the evidence that has been so glaring in this tournament that the generation of Rigobert Song is on its way down as the Essien-Agogo train powers its way up. Source: Daily Graphic