The Ivory Coast were a goal down on 38 minutes. Franck Kessié levelled just after the hour mark and Sebastien Haller netted the winner at 2-1 on 81 minutes. Kossounou was in the starting line-up and he played the full 90 minutes. It is the third AFCON win for the Ivorians and Ivory Coast is the first country since Egypt in 2006 to lift the trophy in their own country.
Ivory Coast reached the knockout stage as one of the four best third-placed teams in the groups. That was followed by a win against Senegal in the Round of 16, victory over Mali in the quarter-finals and DR Congo in the semi-finals.
Bayer 04 congratulates Odilon Kossounou and wishes him a great time celebrating with his teammates. The whole club is looking forward to his return.
Rüdiger Vollborn has been at the club for 40 years, is Bayer 04’s record appearance holder in the Bundesliga with 401 games, and is the only Leverkusen player to have won both the UEFA Cup (1988) and the DFB-Pokal (1993). And the Berliner stayed with the Werkself after ending his impressive playing career as he worked as a goalkeeping coach for the following nine years. Vollborn now works under the Bayer Cross as a fan liaison officer and club archivist. Since February 2021, the personalised Black and Red encyclopaedia takes Werkself fans on a brief trip through the history of Bayer 04 every month with our series ‘Rudi recounts…’.
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The Werkself are away at Roma for the first leg of their 2023/24 UEFA Europa League semi-final tie on Thursday, 2 May (kick-off 9pm CEST). The Bayer 04 Fan Liaison team has all the info you need for the match at the Stadio Olimpico in the Italian capital…
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Bayer 04 host AS Roma at the BayArena in the UEFA Europa League semi-final second leg on Thursday, 9 May (kick-off: 9pm CEST). Here’s all you need to know about how to get tickets.
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There's late, and then there's Leverkusen late: once again, Bayer 04 averted a first defeat of the season at the death in Saturday evening's match against VfB Stuttgart, and have now gained nine points through goals fromthe 90th minute onwards this season - a new Bundesliga record. In all competitions, Xabi Alonso's side have scored 16 goals in stoppage time. More analysis of a thrilling contest in our Werkself Review.
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