MTN Elite One: Colombe wins maiden crown, Union suffers first demotion in nearly 70 years.

The team got the goals courtesy of forward, Brice Edmond Sindjo, who opened the scoring at the 22nd minute before Patrick Handzongo and Luc Armand Bide added the second and third at the 64th and 86th minutes, respectively.

The victory expanded Colombe’s points tally to 60 points, beyond the reach of the rest of the other 15 other teams with just three regular match days left to end the season.

The club sits 11points ahead of second spot holders, Panthere of Nde, that has 49points after staging 27 of its 30 matches.

North Region pair of Coton Sport and Gazelle Football Academy both of Garoua who have each played 27 of their 30 matches, and are placed third and fourth with 48 and 47points, respectively. 

Colombe’s league triumph confirmation comes two weeks after the club had earlier declared itself as the winner of the campaign before multiple rulings by the competition’s disciplinary and homologation committee made several adjustments which led to the South Region eagles dropping crucial points and getting forced to wait for more days before knowing its fate.

The committee in its rulings had deducted 6points from the Colombe team after ordering that the team plays two of its matches that it had won by forfeiture against Bamboutos Football Club of Mbouda and Stade Renard of Melong for diverse reasons. 

The deduction brought Colombe back to within the reach of Gazelle FA which had 46points, just 10points fewer than Colombe. At the time, they were five match days to the conclusion of the season.

The 2024/2025 crown which comes some 72 years after the creation of the Colombe team in 1953, makes the outfit the first club from the South Region team to emerge as winners of the first division championship in Cameroon. 

The team walked its way to the title after winning 18 of its 25 matches. Six of its matches ended in draws. It has suffered just a single defeat since the campaign flagged off. 

The success in the league title race adds to a similar milestone that the club attained in the Cup of Cameroon last year. Colombe won the 2024 Cup of Cameroon to become the first outfit from the South Region to bag the national challenge cup trophy. 

Union relegated for first time in 67 years

Down in the bottom half of the league standing, last weekend’s actions in the topflight championship culminated in Union of Douala suffering its first relegation from the top-tier league competition in Cameroon in 67 years.

The Littoral Region side was demoted after fellow relegation battling team, AS Fortuna, staged a 1-1 draw with Bamboutos Football Club of Mbouda. The 1-1 tie with Bamboutos increased Fortuna’s tally to 32points in 27 matches. 

Fortuna maintained 12th position, the first relegation safety spot on the league standing from the bottom, following the point increase. But the increase meant it had created a 13points gap from Union as the league nears its end.

Union is placed 15th on the standing of the 16-team competition. With just 19points harvested in the 26 matches that it has garnered so far, the team will not be able to coverup the gap created by Fortuna even if it wins all its last four matches to harvest 12points. 

Union of Douala has been competing in the Elite One championship since it gained promotion to the competition in 1958, some three years after its creation in 1955.

The club is one of Cameroon’s most decorated football outfits, having won 13 major trophies nationally and internationally.

It won the CAF Champions League in 1979 and bagged the now abandoned CAF Cup Winners Cup in 1981. It has harvested five Elite One crowns. The side also has six Cup of Cameroon trophies. 

The recent relegation come four years after the Union outfit was demoted at the end of the 2020/2021 season.

The side luckily found itself getting maintained after the current executive at the Cameroon Football Federation, opted to maintain all the clubs that featured in the two elite championships that seasons. 

This article was first published in The Guardian Post Edition No:3469 of Tuesday June 10, 2025