AFCON 2023 Qualifiers: All you need to know about the group stage draw
The draw for the group stage of the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers will hold on Tuesday, April 19 with 48 countries set to know their fate.
The event will take place by 5:30pm GMT at the SuperSport Studio in South Africa with former AFCON winners Lucas Radebe (South Africa) and Salomon Kalou (Ivory Coast) to assist with the draw.
How will the countries be paired?
The countries have been classified into a group of 12 in four pots based on the latest FIFA ranking.
The draw will start with Pot 4 and will end with Pot 1.
Pot 1: Senegal, Morocco, Nigeria, Egypt, Tunisia, Cameroon, Algeria, Mali, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Ghana and DR Congo.
Pot 2: South Africa, Kenya, Sierra Leone, Madagascar, Equatorial Guinea, Congo, Zambia, Uganda, Benin, Gabon, Guinea and Cape Verde.
Pot 3: Namibia, Mauritania, Guinea-Bissau, Niger, Libya, Mozambique, Malawi, Togo, Zimbabwe, Gambia, Angola and Comoros.
Pot 4: Tanzania, Central African Republic, Sudan, Rwanda, Burundi, Ethiopia, Eswatini, Lesotho, Botswana, Liberia, South Sudan, and Sao Tome and Principe.
How many groups will be formed and how teams will qualify?
A team will be picked from each pot to form a group of four teams, and it will finally give 12 groups (A-L).
Meanwhile, Ivory Coast will participate despite qualifying automatically for next year’s showpiece as the host country.
At the end of the group fixtures, 24 teams will qualify for AFCON 2023 – every winner and runner-up in each group.
NOTE: Kenya and Zimbabwe, even though they are in Pot 2 and Pot 3 respectively, risk automatic elimination as they are currently suspended by FIFA over their government’s interference in the country’s football associations. If the ban is not lifted two weeks before the first round of games, they will be removed without replacement which will leave their groups with three teams.
When will the group stage games commence?
After the draw on Tuesday, the group games will start in June 2022 and end in March 2023.
Matchday 1 and 2 will be in June 2022, followed by Matchday 3 and 4 in September 2022 and the final round of games in March 2023.
