Cameroon women celebrate WAFCON title during victory parade

Women Football

Cameroon’s women’s soccer soccer team won the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations on Sunday with a 3-0 victory over tournament debutant Malawi and were welcomed with scores of fans outside the Yaounde’s international airport on Monday afternoon.

At the airport, fans were overcome with joy. “We’ve been watching the games since the first game. We have seen them transform into butterflies. We are so happy, really. Long live the Lionesses!” yelled supporter Lyndsay Tango.

The team paraded through Yaounde as men, women and children lined the streets to cheer for them. For Arlette Missilisem, the win was about more than just soccer. “It validates what a woman can achieve beyond simply watching the children and staying at home. She can go beyond that.

So this feeling is truly a joy for me as a young Cameroonian woman,” she said. FIFA’s under-fire president, Gianni Infantino, attended the game along with CAF President Patrice Motsepe. Infantino later helped Motsepe hand out medals to the top three teams.

Algeria defeated Morocco in the third-place decider on Saturday. Infantino also posed with Motsepe and Samuel Eto’o, the president of the Cameroon Football Federation, for a photo with Cameroon forward Monique Ngock after she received the player of the tournament trophy.