Namibia’s Deon Hotto scored in the 88th minute to hand them a shock 1-0 victory against Tunisia at the Africa Cup of Nations on Tuesday and keep up the sequence of surprise results that have dominated the opening days of the tournament. The winger sneaked in at the back post to hand the southern African country, 87 places below Tunisia in the world rankings, a deserved win as they were markedly more enterprising and created the better chances in the opening Group E encounter at the Amadou Gon Coulibaly Stadium. Namibia, competing in their fourth finals but who had never won a match, should have won by a more handsome margin but were let down by poor decision-making. Tunisia are the top seeds in the group but laboured through the game and their goalkeeper Bechir Ben Said make several key stops to deny the Namibia captain, Peter Shalulile. Hotto also wasted a clear first-half opportunity and had a curling free-kick saved minutes before he ghosted in at the back post to secure the victory. Tunisia did force a sharp save out of Loydt Kazapua in the final 15 minutes with a header that was acrobatically tipped over the top but that was as close as they came in a game where they were expected to dominate. The north Africans, who are the third highest African side in the Fifa rankings at 28, looked nervy and out of sorts. They join Ghana as former winners who have lost their opening match at the tournament while Algeria, Cameroon, Egypt and Nigeria were all held in games they were expected to win. Bertrand Traoré scored a stoppage-time penalty as Burkina Faso claimed a 1-0 victory against Mauritania in their Group D match at the Stade de la Paix in Bouake, writing a piece of history in the process. It is the first win for the Burkinabe in their opening match of the African showpiece finals and came at the 13th attempt, handed to them when the Aston Villa midfielder Traoré stroked home his spot-kick after a foul by Mauritania’s captain, Mohamed El Abd, on Issa Kaboré. Burkina Faso dominated possession but it was Mauritania who carved out the better chances, though they were denied by the excellent reflexes of the goalkeeper Hervé Koffi and will feel aggrieved not to have got something from the game having conceded in the 96th minute. Burkina Faso head the pool with their three points after the first round of matches. The fancied Algeria team were held surprisingly to a 1-1 draw by Angola on Monday. Mali took advantage of an early let-off to beat South Africa 2-0 and take the lead in Group E. After Percy Tau missed a penalty for South Africa the Mali captain, Hamari Traoré, broke the deadlock after an hour and Lassine Sinayoko added a second six minutes later to put the west Africans ahead of Namibia on goal difference in the standings. Traoré was quickest to react and scored from centimetres out after the South Africa goalkeeper, Ronwen Williams, had barely kept out a curling free-kick from Sekou Koita at the Amadou Gon Coulibaly Stadium. The second goal came soon after as a through ball put Sinayoko goal-side and he shrugged off two defensive challenges to score from close range.