She wanted to inspire a little more fear in her opponents. In 2022, the Benin national team decided to change its nickname after years of hesitation. Exit “the squirrels”, make way for the “cheetahs”, an animal considered more impressive and more in line with the values of a team which wishes to climb the ladder of African football and shine at the 2025 African Cup of Nations. This Tuesday, the Beninese enter the fray, with a match against the DRC scheduled for 1:30 p.m.
Certainly, faced with the Ivorian Elephants, the Indomitable Cameroonian Lions or the Tunisian Carthage Eagles, the Squirrels were no match. Chosen at the beginning of the 1970s by the first president of the Beninese Federation Norbert Imbs, he nevertheless had a certain logic. He found that the skill, speed and agility of the little squirrel represented a nation that wanted to make its way into the continental hierarchy.
Half a century later, however, the Beninese no longer wanted it. If a first unsuccessful attempt had been started in 2008, the debate was relaunched in 2018, with the creation of a commission to determine the new nickname of the national team, supposed to “resonate with the population and reflect our strong ambitions in the world of sport”, as a press release explains.
Some argued for “pythons”
A choice followed by the players. “Squirrels aren’t scary,” smiled former Clermontois Jodel Dossou to 90football. They are fast and intelligent but the Atlas Lions (Morocco), the Teranga Lions (Senegal), these are animal names that scare people. I think we tried to achieve the same thing. »
Despite everything, it will take almost four years to ratify the new no, notably after a consultation of supporters. If Steve Mounié, former Brest striker now at Alanyaspor (Turkey), had pleaded for the “Pythons”, one of the symbols of Benin, he was not heard. “There is a python temple in Benin, there is a great culture around the python. They love the python here,” he told the BBC.
His appeal was not heard. In February 2022, the new nickname was made official and the “Cheetahs” were born. An “evocative and respectable” name, as the Federation wanted. “Now we are the cheetahs and we have to take responsibility for it. A cheetah is fast and fierce,” said former Clermont and Angers defender Cédric Hountondji. “You have to be there with this name,” agrees Jodel Dossou. The Beninese will compete in their first major competition with this nickname.
