It was a close call for some, but it didn’t matter. Africa achieved a high-quality overall performance during the group stage of the 2026 World Cup. The results? Ten nations entered… and nine qualified!
It’s very simple, with only one eliminated (Tunisia), Africa is the confederation which finishes the group stage with the best percentage of qualifiers. It’s better than Europe (13/16), which lost Scotland, the Czech Republic and Turkey, and South America (5/6), where Uruguay is the big disappointment.
The overall picture is excellent, and Africa took full advantage of the 48-nation format, as Algeria, DRC, Senegal and Ghana progressed through the group stage via the best third-place rankings. Without that, it would still have given a very nice 5/10, with Cape Verde, Ivory Coast, Morocco, South Africa and Egypt, who finished second in their group.
Africa is doing much better than Asia
The downside? No African nation finished among the group winners, where there are seven Europeans, three South Americans, and two host countries from the Concacaf zone.
In addition, since Europe remains the standard value, it should be noted that the African selections have only won one match against those of the Old Continent (Morocco-Scotland). But at the same time, there were some very good draws (Cape Verde-Spain, Ghana-England, DRC-Portugal, Egypt-Belgium), also counting the one between the Atlas Lions and Brazil.
In reality, it is especially Asia which is doing poorly in this World Cup with only two qualified (Japan and Australia) and seven already eliminated, out of the 12 nations returning home.
