SELVA DI SASANO, Italy: The name of the country evolved from the Portuguese word for shrimp, camarao, which might have been an appropriate nickname for Cameroon when the World Cup finals began earlier this month. Though champion of Africa the team was still viewed as only an appetizer for other teams in its group in the world championship soccer tournament. Yet through the first round of play, which ends this week, no other team among the 24 participating has caused such a stir.

In winning their first two games a remarkable 10 upset of the defending champion, Argentina, and a 21 victory over Romania the Cameroonian players have clearly fulfilled the promise and ferocity of their true nickname, the Indomitable Lions.

With one first round match to play Monday night in Bari against the Soviet Union the Lions have already assured themselves of a place among ‘the 1 6 teams that will advance to Round two, when the month long tournaments changes to a formal in which ‘one loss eliminates a team.

The Lions two victories have not only unleashed a wave of joy across ‘Africa a soccer mad continent, they have also given Cameroonians new hope that investors and tourists might discover their land, just above the ‘equator in the crook of Africa’s West ‘Coast.

Further, they have give impetus to growing feeling that Africa deserves more than two places (Cameroon and Egypt filled them this year) in the World Cup finals, compared with 13 for Europe.

Like many African nations, Cameroon is inching from an agricultural base toward industrialization. Nearly two thirds of the country’s 11 million people are still earning a living from the soil. Five years ago, the nation was without television. A brochure recently published by the Government Proudly boasts of “tarred” roadways now in place. Money is scarce; goods are limited and expensive. Many of the fields used by soccer clubs are of sand, unlike the manicured lawns of Europe.

“We have so many tribes in our country,” said Prof Pierre Tsala Mbala, the national team’s physiologist since 19 7 6, “Football is one way to unite our country, the only way to have our people fit together. I don’t know of another event to mean more to our people than football. Football is a big unifier in our country.

A Very Full House

The sport is so popular that eight years ago in Yaoundé, the capital, and more than 200,000 people attended Cameroons World Cup qualifying match with Morocco in a stadium that seats 50,000.

“Tn Africa a seat for | is a seat for 10,” said Theophile Abege, a retired midfielder who starred for the national team for years. “There were 500,000 more outside the stadium, with their radios chattering. They were there to support the team to live with the team.”

Mr. Abege, the players and others in Cameroon’s World Cup delegation are based here in a tiny hilltop town in Italy’s bel, overlooking white washed stone houses, acres of olive tree groves and the Adriatic Sea beyond. The team practices at a small field at the foot of the hill, in the town of Fasano, where children watch them train and tug at their jacket sleeves for autographs.

In recent days, many of the Cameroonians have talked by telephone to relatives and friends at home. They have all heard the variations on a theme, of the joy over the team’s victories, of the celebrations of the expectations for continued success. “There is happiness all over the country,” said Mbena Mengue, the director of the Prevoyance Football Club in Yaounde and head of the delegation. “The walking has stopped. People are dancing. They are enjoying themselves. This is a very big event in our country. Very big.”

“Feasts”, said Professor Mbala, who has spoken to his wife in Yaounde, “Many feasts, people drink lots of beer and palm drinks and eat lots of food, meat, beef, chicken, fishes, and small animals from the bush. Some people were up all night last Friday making feasts.”

Beyond the joy, however, Cameroonians are hoping that victories might generate other benefits for their country, the way staging the 1988 Summer Olympics helped South Korea reach trade agreements with new partners, like the Soviet Union and some of its former satellite states.

‘Cameroon which gained independence 30 years ago after decades as a divided country under British and French control, sorely needs assistance in all aspects of society, chiefly economic. Aside from just two large cities, Yaounde and Douala and several remote game preserves the country lacks the kind of magnets that attract investment and tourists.

The World Cup is a rare opportunity to bring Cameroon attention from beyond the continent. Mr. Mengue cited Valery Nepomniachi, a former assistant coach with the Soviet national tea, who was hired last year to coach the Lions, as an example of the benefits of foreign assistance.

“If we can be helped in joint ventures in the matters of sports management,” Mr. Mengue said, “we can be helped to make up our infrastructure. So maybe this is an occasion for others to come and visit in Cameroon, ”The entire world is talking about Cameroon,” said Michel Kaham a Cameroonian who once played for the Cleveland Force of the Major Indoor Soccer League in the United States and is now an assistant under Mr. Nepomniachi. “Maybe some will come to visit.”

Played Well in “82

This is Cameroon’s second appearance in the World Cup finals, in 1982, the Lions played remarkably well, tying each other opponents Peru, Poland and the eventual champion, Italy but failing to advance. Returning home they were greeted as heroes, and the adulation resonated throughout the continent.

Over the next few years, they established themselves as one of Africa’s premier teams, and many of the players signed professional contracts in France and elsewhere, The team won the African Nations Cup in 1984, finished second to Egypt in 198 6, Zambia beat Cameroon in the World Cup qualification to join Morocco in the finals.

Meanwhile other African teams, have improved to the point that Mr. Abege now an admistrator with Air Cameroon said that as many as six others could have done as well as Cameroon in this year’s World Cup. He named Algeria, Morocco, Zambia, Ghana, Zaire and Nigeria.

In the final analysis though, many of the players attribute the team’s success not so much to order or chaos but to heart, the heart of the lion.

They speak of a harmonious team, a team of brothers, of laughers, of dancers, of men who are not surprised in the least by their accomplishments.

“In Cameroon, big lions are like gods” said Jean Claude Pagal, a 21 year old defenseman. “When we play we have lions in our hearts.

Article extracted from this publication >> June 22, 1990