On Sunday night, against the best team in Africa, Wilfried Bony scored a brace to fire Ivory Coast into the semi-finals of the Africa Cup of Nations. The Elephants sent Algeria packing and will face the Democratic Republic of Congo in the semi-finals on Wednesday.

His new club Manchester City must be pleased, watching their £28-million player starting to fire at just the right time. He’s the most expensive African player the Premier League has ever had, but like so many of his countrymen, he came from humble beginnings. Like many others, he started off playing street football before joining an academy that would allow him to refine his game.

Ivory Coast has something of a reputation for producing quality players. The ASEC Mimosa academy in Abidjan has produced some of the world’s most famous players. From the Toure brothers to Gervinho, the academy is famous for churning out excellent talent. It’s a grand facility with specialised gymnasiums, tennis courts and swimming pools, but Bony’s journey to stardom did not start here.

He attended the The Domoraud Academy in Bingerville, where he arrived at age 12. For three years of his life he nurtured his talents at the academy under the watchful eye of Cyrille Domoraud, the man who founded the academy.

“I started the centre because I had the chance to go to Europe when I was very young. There are so many young Ivorians who would wish to be in my place,” he recently said in an interview with BBC Sport.

“I gave Wilfried Bony the chance and several other players because I told myself I am giving football back what it gave to me.”

But Bony would not have made it were it not for his own determination. “Serious” is a word often used to describe the 26-year-old. He doesn’t joke about too much and instead focuses on his goals, while that’s hardly a significant attribute, evidence of just how determined he is can be traced back to how his career has evolved since his early days at the academy.

Back then, Bony played as a defender, a complete contrast to his current position as striker. Perhaps that is why he can run circles around defenders so easily. He knows exactly what they are thinking. With 25 goals in 54 appearances for Swansea and 46 goals in 65 appearances for his previous club, Vitesesse in Holland, Bony is well on track to becoming an African legend. He has hit a purple patch at the perfect time and one which Ivory Coast will hope can help elevate them from always being the bridesmaid to being the bride.

Even with some of the most talented players in their midst, they have always come up short. Ivory Coast’s quarter-final in the Africa Cup of Nations in 2013 came against the eventual winners – Nigeria. But that’s not the only time they came up short. In 2006, they lost to Egypt on penalties in AFCON, they lost the semi-final in 2008, then in the quarterfinals in 2010 and in the final in 2012.

Now they are in yet another crunch contest and on paper, they are the favourites by a country mile. After the disappointment of last year’s World Cup, where they crashed out in the group stages with just a single win to their names, Ivory Coast will surely start believing that their time has finally come.

He is also part of a new generation of Ivorian players that play with far less baggage than some of their predecessors. Prior to their first World Cup, then coach Henri Michel lamented: “They are carrying more than their fair share of baggage. They believe that peace hinges on them.”

They would eventually qualify for the 2006 World Cup in what proved to be watershed moment for the country. A fragmented country was united through their achievement. Didier Drogba begged for the warring factions to surrender their arms. Drogba, ever the statesman, reminded everyone that the team represented Ivorian society in unity. A week later, a ceasefire was announced.

Four years later, Bony made his debut and spent the next five years playing alongside Drogba, who was always there to offer a helpful word. Many would start to draw comparisons between the two and even go as far as calling Bony “The New Drogba”. But he’s not. Despite his style of play being very different to that of Drogba, to call him “the next Drogba” would be to diminish his reputation. He’s not the new anything. He’s simply Bony, a player carving out his own legend on the African and global stage. And there is no better time to prove just how bright his star is shining than at the semi-final of the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations. DM

Photo: Nicolas N’Koulou of Cameroon (back) fights for the ball with Wilfried Bony (R) of Ivory Coast during their Group D soccer match of the 2015 African Cup of Nations in Malabo January 28, 2015. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh