The Nile Ritz-Carlton hotel located in Egypt’s capital Cairo is hosting the high and mighty in African football as the final draw for African World Cup 2022 qualifiers is held today, January 21.
Africa’s race to elect representatives for the next World Cup enters the second round with today’s draw. There are forty teams expected to pooled into 10 groups after the draw.
The forty comprises – the 14 winners of the first-round of qualifiers. They are joined by the 26 highest African nations in the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking (as of December 2019). Only the section winners advance to the third round and final round.
The second round qualifying phase starts in March 2020 and comes to an end in October 2021. Ten teams will make it to that stage.
For the third and final round, the ten group winners will be drawn into five two-legged knockout ties to be played in November 2021.
The pots
- Pot 1: Algeria, Senegal, Tunisia, Morocco, Ghana, Egypt, Cameroon, Mali, Congo DR
- Pot 2: Burkina Faso, South Africa, Guinea, Uganda, Cabo Verde, Gabon, Benin, Zambia, Congo, Côte d’Ivoire
- Pot 3: Madagascar, Mauritania, Libya, Mozambique, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Niger, Central African Republic, Namibia, Guinea-Bissau
- Pot 4: Malawi, Angola, Togo, Sudan, Rwanda, Tanzania, Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia, Liberia, Djibouti
