It was a tale of the unusual this evening in Rustenburg, South Africa, as a bent goal post forced the stoppage of a crucial Group D match between Algeria and Togo in the 29^th Africa Cup of Nations.

The match, which started 6 O’clock GMT, had only five more minutes left when an Algerian player drew the referee’s attention to the fact that the Togolese goal post was not straight.

The referee promptly stopped the match and beckoned on the tournament’s organising officials, who made frantic efforts to straighten the goal post.

After about five minutes of fruitless efforts to straighten the goal post, the officials had to remove and completely replace it. In all, it took about ten minutes before the problem was solved and the match restarted.

For Algeria, one of the pre-tournament favourites, it was an unexpected early end of the road as they became the first of the 16 teams to crash out of the 2013 AFCON.

Togo, who lost their first match 1-2 to Ivory Coast on Monday, surged into the second position on the table after winning 2-0. Emmanuel Adebayor outpaced his pursuers to slot in the first goal in the 30^th minute while substitute Dove Wome equally outran his markers to power in the second goal in extra time.

The implication is that Algeria’s last match next Wednesday against table-toping Ivory Coast is a mere formality while Togo and Tunisia, both of whom have three points, will decide who among them would survive after their final group game same Monday.

Meanwhile, Ivory Coast have become the first to qualify for the quarter-finals as the result of their last match will not alter their position at all.

•Photo: Action from last Monday’s Togo/Ivory Coast match.