Senegal national team manager, Aliou Cisse, praised his players after they defeated Tunisia 1-0 on Sunday at the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations semi-finals.

After the tense game against Tunisia, that saw each side missing a penalty in regular time, and Tunisia having another penalty ruled down using VAR, Cisse spoke to CAFOnline.com.

“I feel very proud”, the ex- Teranga Lions captain said. “We haven’t reached the final since 17 years. This is the fruit of a long time preparation. Those players worked hard for five full years and now we get the fruit of this hard work”.

“Football is always charming. At a moment you think you lost control over the game and fate will do it all. Against Tunisia it was like that. This is a game for history” he added.

Senegal’s only appearance in the final was in 2002 in Mali and Cisse was the national team’s captain during the tournament.

Senegal lost the final to Cameroon by penalty shootouts and Cisse was one of the three players who missed a penalty.

Cisse’s generation is considered the golden generation of Senegalese football as they led the country to 2002 World Cup quarter finals. However, Cisse believes that these group of players are better than the players from 2002.

“I have unlimited trust in my players and I felt they want to achieve something. They did all what is needed to win. This generation is better than the 2002 one. My players told me they will be better than us, and they did.” Cisse added.

Senegal players are expecting a tough final against Algeria on Friday night at Cairo Stadium and they hope to be Senegal’s first generation to win the AFCON title.