Keita missed the decisive match through suspension.
Naby Keïta was forced to watch on Monday as his country lost their Round of 16 match and were eliminated from the African Cup of Nations. Guinea lost 1-0 against Gambia, with both teams eventually going down to 10 men in the final minutes.
Keïta picked up two yellow cards in the group stages, which meant he was ineligible to play in this match.
Gambian attacker Musa Barrow scored the match’s only goal in the 71st minute. Then in the 87th minute, Yusupha Njie was shown a second yellow card in the match. Guinea couldn’t take advantage of having the extra player to send the game into overtime. They only had six minutes to make it count before Guinea’s Ibrahima Sory Conté suffered the same fate.
Conté had previously had an equalizer called offside and then hit the post moments before picking up his second yellow at the death. Surely not a day for him to remember.
With Guinea out of the tournament, that means Keïta will be the first of Liverpool’s African players to rejoin the team.
Senegal is scheduled to play against Cape Verde Islands on Tuesday, but after the tragic stadium crush that killed at least seven people in Yaounde on Monday night, it’s unclear if those games will go on as planned.
