"Only three teams eliminated from the World Cup" prelude to the quarterfinals of the Africa Cup of Nations, and Morocco is the No. 1 winner

*This content was translated by AI.

The prelude to the quarterfinals of the 2025 African Football Confederation (CAF) Africa Cup of Nations, which will determine the strongest team on the African continent, will be held. Morocco, ranked 11th in the FIFA rankings, was the top candidate selected by soccer statistics media.

The Africa Cup of Nations will be held over two days in the order of Cameroon (57th), Morocco (34th), Nigeria (38th), Egypt (35th) and Cote d'Ivoire (42nd), starting with the first quarterfinal match between Mali (53rd in FIFA) and Senegal (19th) at Grand Stade de Tangier in Morocco at 1 a.m. on the 10th (Korea time).

Among the teams that advanced to the quarterfinals, five teams made it to the 2026 FIFA North American World Cup finals: Morocco, Senegal, Algeria, Egypt and Ivory Coast. Mali, Cameroon, and Nigeria failed to advance to the World Cup finals, but they reached the quarterfinals of this tournament.

South Africa, which belongs to the same group with South Korea in the World Cup, and Tunisia, which is in the same group with Japan, were eliminated early in the round of 16 of the tournament. Ghana and Cabo Verde, also ahead of the World Cup finals, did not even make it to the Africa Cup of Nations.

Morocco is the host country and has the highest FIFA ranking in Africa.

Morocco, which also made the semifinal splash at the 2022 FIFA Qatar World Cup, will try to win the title for the first time in 50 years in this tournament after recently winning the 2025 FIFA Arab Cup. Football statistics media Opta set Morocco's winning probability at 23.3%, the highest among the quarterfinals.

Senegal, ranked second in FIFA rankings, came second to Morocco with a 16.6% chance of winning, followed by Algeria with 13.9%, Nigeria with 12% and Egypt with 11.8%. Côte d'Ivoire was 10.7%, while Cameroon and Mali were 6.5% and 5.2%, respectively.

The African Cup of Nations is a major national competition organized by continental soccer federations such as the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Asian Cup and the UEFA European Championship (Euro). The defending champion is Ivory Coast, and the most winning team in the tournament is Egypt (seven times). South Africa, which belongs to the same group as South Korea, won its only tournament in 1996.

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*This content was translated by AI.