Senegal beats Oman for final place at Olympics

Heading through: Ibrahima Balde scores Senegal\'s opener The draw for the 2012 London Olympics football tournament will take place April 24, and the final team of the 16 that will take part has been decided. Senegal beat Oman to claim that last spot in a match played out in Coventry, which also served as a test event prior to the start of the Olympics.
The match took place at the Ricoh Stadium, which will be called the City of Coventry Stadium for the Olympics this summer. Coventry City FC, who play their home match at the Ricoh Stadium, were relegated to the third tier of English football last Saturday. The match between Senegal and Oman game drew a crowd of more than 11,500.
The match was a playoff and the teams earned berths by coming in just short of their respective continental competition\'s berths.
Senegal placed fourth in the Africa U-23 tourney, while Oman took the top spot in a three-team Asian playoff.
Senegal won the match by two goals to nil, and it probably should have been more. The Omani side were out muscled and out played for most of the 90 minutes.
It was the first Olympic match played in Great Britian since 1971, when the British team beat Bulgaria by a goal to nil in the first leg of an Olympic qualifying match. Britain went on to lose five nil in the second leg and didn\'t qualify for the Munich Games. This will be the first time since that a team from Great Britain will take part in the Olympics.
As they are the host nation, Great Britain automatically qualifies, and will be joined by 15 other teams representing their respective nations.
The men’s football tournament for the London Olympics will begin on July 26, with the opening matches being played at Hampden Park in Glasgow.