How long before an African team wins a World Cup?

[Paadi]

Hey,

As I'm sure everyone notices, each and every world cup for atleast a decade now, there are more and better African teams in the world cup.
I remember reading thst the former Cameroon manager reckoned that, 'by 2010, there will be two African teams in the World Cup semi-finals'.

Do you think in this world cup, there is an African team capable of reaching the semi's, and how long do you think it will be, before an African team could win it?

Thanks, Pad.

[glennaldo_sf]

I don't think African football is as strong as it has been in the last couple of world cups. Nigeria and Cameroon appear to be struggling at the moment and it does not look like the latter will even qualify. I doubt an African team will mount a serious challenge this time around - especially with the world cup in Germany - although Ivory Coast might be able to pull off a Senegal.

2010 will be a different matter altogether though with the world cup in Africa and I can definitely see at least one African team in the last four.

[dor02]

I don't think African football is as strong as it has been in the last couple of world cups. Nigeria and Cameroon appear to be struggling at the moment and it does not look like the latter will even qualify. I doubt an African team will mount a serious challenge this time around - especially with the world cup in Germany - although Ivory Coast might be able to pull off a Senegal.

2010 will be a different matter altogether though with the world cup in Africa and I can definitely see at least one African team in the last four.

Agreed. WC 2010 will be a great chance for the Africans to get some success. For me personally I think Nigeria and Cameroon have already had their best chances to make the World Cup Final.

[MoRado]

like in 25 years maybe

[ursula]

I think there's a tendency in thinking that Nigeria and Cameroon are the best of Africa and if they are doing poorly then the whole continent is doing poorly. That's a myth.

Nigeria and Cameroon have been the best African teams overall in the past decade but by no means do they have the dominance on their continent that Brazil and Argentina have on theirs or even Mexico and the US have on theirs.

- Since Mexico 86 there has been one African team that's made it out of the first group stage in the WC finals. That's five world cup finals. And it's been four different teams doing the trick: Morocco, Cameroon, Nigeria, and Senegal with only Nigeria repeating.

-Since 86 the African Nation's Cup has had 10 different finalists in nine competitions. Nigeria has the most appearances with four followed by South Africa and Tunisia with three each. Cameroon has had two appearances only while Algeria, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Zambia, Egypt, and Morocco have all made an appearance.

One could go on but the point here is that Cameroon and Nigeria, while in the elite of African soccer have not been the all-dominating teams that some folks outside the continent think.

So we come to this year's WCQs and the two teams looking the strongest at this point are not Cameroon and Nigeria (though Nigeria are doing well) but Senegal and Ivory Coast. If you go past the names of the countries and look at the stars on those teams you can well understand that those later two teams stand to do very well in Germany. If you compare Cameroon's lineup with Ivory Coast's you'd see a pretty big advantage for IC in the midfield while their defenses and forwards are pretty even. So it's not that Cameroon have gotten weaker it's that IC has gotten stronger.

What the Ivory Coast is doing is making the case that African international soccer is stronger than ever. And it's not just the Elephants either. Countries like Zambia, Togo, Morocco, and even Kenya are showing that the whole continent is stronger than ever.

[ZeekLTK]

I think Africa is really becoming strong, it's only a matter of time before FIFA realizes it is a travesty to only allow 5 of them to compete in the World Cup when there will be at least a dozen or so that are capable of doing well. Right now IMO all of the following countries could do well at the World Cup:

Togo
Senegal
Zambia
Nigeria
South Africa
Ghana
Cote d'Ivoire
Cameroon
Tunisia
Morocco
Guniea

And then teams like Kenya, Angola, Zimbabwe, Egypt, Libya, Congo DR, and apparently Cape Verde Islands even could compete as well. Africa deserves more than 5 bids, but where will they come from? Unless the World Cup is expanded, I would have to say maybe 1-1.5 from Asia and the rest from Europe. Africa has just as many nations as Europe, yet UEFA has nearly 3 times as many teams in the World Cup as CAF (14-5). I'll be cheering for Cote d'Ivoire, and the other 4 nations who make it to do well for Africa... that is of course unless they go up against the USA or Norway. :p

[Metro00]

I agree with those team doing well--FIFA should definitely allow more teams to compete--I think they will be great competition for the teams already in the World Cup.

[glennaldo_sf]

Good post ZeekLTK. However, I am not really sure if I agree with you that Africa should get more WC spots than they are already allocated. At the rate they are going at, we are seeing 1/5 teams that qualify for the finals actually advance beyond the 2nd round. That's only 20% which is just not high enough to justify allocating extra places. Senegal did Africa proud in 2002 and Nigeria and Cameroon both brought decent squads, but were drawn into very tough groups that did not allow them to advance. The performances of Tunisia and even South Africa however, were just not convincing enough to really persuade any extra places allocated to Africa for the time being. 2010 will be huge though. I think if Africa can bring that rate up above 50% than FIFA should definitely rethink the amount of places it gives Africa.

[lanman]

How does Africa justify more places? There record is poor at recent tournaments. 80% of their teams failed to advance from the group stages at each of the last World Cups and only two teams have ever reached the last 8. When their record improves on consistant basis they will have a right to demand more spots, until then they are over-represented. The argument that they have as many teams as Europe doesn't hold any water - Oceania has more teams than CONMEBOL so does that come into the equation?

[dor02]

Why give Africa another spot whereas Oceania doesn't have one? This is supposed to be the World Game!

[scaryice]

Not until they have solid infrastucture and strong programs at every level. There will always be a team that catches fire like Cameroon in 1990 or Senegal last time, but they need to be consistant.

[Mani]

African teams have the raw talent. What they lack is a solid infrastucture. I can see an African team winning it all by 2018.

[Justin O]

Conversations like this tend to get mixed up in 3 different conversations.

When will an African team win the WC? Hell, if greece can win the European championship than an nAfrican team could certainly win in 2010, maybe even 2006. It'd take a lot of luck, but sometimes luck is in the offering.

When will an African team truly be the best team in the world? That's not the same as the first question. This won't happen for a long long time. Stability and economic improvements would certainly help.

Then there's the issue mentioned above about the overall quality of African soccer, which is in many ways the most interesting question, and certainly not one that can really be determined by looking at a great World Cup run by one country.

[almango]

I think Africa is really becoming strong, it's only a matter of time before FIFA realizes it is a travesty to only allow 5 of them to compete in the World Cup when there will be at least a dozen or so that are capable of doing well. Right now IMO all of the following countries could do well at the World Cup:

Togo
Senegal
Zambia
Nigeria
South Africa
Ghana
Cote d'Ivoire
Cameroon
Tunisia
Morocco
Guniea

And then teams like Kenya, Angola, Zimbabwe, Egypt, Libya, Congo DR, and apparently Cape Verde Islands even could compete as well. Africa deserves more than 5 bids, but where will they come from? Unless the World Cup is expanded, I would have to say maybe 1-1.5 from Asia and the rest from Europe. Africa has just as many nations as Europe, yet UEFA has nearly 3 times as many teams in the World Cup as CAF (14-5). I'll be cheering for Cote d'Ivoire, and the other 4 nations who make it to do well for Africa... that is of course unless they go up against the USA or Norway. :p

Rubbish. They have 5 teams qualifying now and even though statistically there is a 50% chance of going through to the second round Africa onl;y manages 1 out of 5 through. When they improve that percentage then they may get more spots. All there results show right now is that they have too many spots.

[almango]

Good post ZeekLTK. However, I am not really sure if I agree with you that Africa should get more WC spots than they are already allocated. At the rate they are going at, we are seeing 1/5 teams that qualify for the finals actually advance beyond the 2nd round. That's only 20% which is just not high enough to justify allocating extra places. Senegal did Africa proud in 2002 and Nigeria and Cameroon both brought decent squads, but were drawn into very tough groups that did not allow them to advance. The performances of Tunisia and even South Africa however, were just not convincing enough to really persuade any extra places allocated to Africa for the time being. 2010 will be huge though. I think if Africa can bring that rate up above 50% than FIFA should definitely rethink the amount of places it gives Africa.

This is a post that I can agree with.

[Football_not_soccer]

I think mayb in a decade, mayb a bit more...really depends on the conditions in Africa, if conditions gets better in Africa n more funding can go into Football they can win it in no time...African players r really fundmentally sound n athletic

[adri]

well, the following teams are leading the're WCQ groups & could be going to WC06:

Senegal
South Africa
Côte d'Ivoire
Nigeria
Morocco

of the above i think Côte d'Ivoire and Nigeria have the best chance of success in Germany. Morrocco have a good squad but the players are quite young, likewise S Africa. Senegal...could do well, could go out without a point, ya never know.

as for winning the World Cup? hell, Côte d'Ivoire are playing with quite a bit o' magic these days... :cool:

[|--LdC--|]

I would like to see more spots to Africa instead of Asia and the Americas.

[SweetLew]

When hell freezes over

[miky]

i think africa would make an impact this world cup,its high time.i also see nigeria cameroon and senegal qualifying,cameroon however low in group standing would rise up to the occasion.we all have new brand of players playing for one of the world top clubs.