FLAWLESS MOROCCO BOOK THEIR SPOT

Morocco have not sat back on the laurels of becoming the first African side to reach the World Cup semifinals. Since Qatar 2022, they have continued to back up their top ranking on the continent with a flawless qualifying campaign, booking an early berth at next year's finals in North America by keeping up the only 100 per cent record in the African qualifying section.

- Mark Gleeson

The Atlas Lions secured their place by hammering Niger 5-0 at home, and then impressively won 2-0 in Zambia with a side of fringe players.

September's seventh and eighth round of group matches also saw Tunisia book their slot for what will be a seventh appearance at the finals, after a stoppage-time goal from Mohamed Ben Romdhane away in Equatorial Guinea.

With two rounds of qualifiers left to come in October, the rest of the likely group winners are clear and only major upsets can derail Egypt, Senegal, South Africa, Cape Verde, Ivory Coast, Algeria and Ghana from emerging as the other group winners.

Only the top-placed teams in the nine groups advance to the finals, but there is a further berth available through playoffs for the four best runners-up, which offers redemption for the likes of Cameroon and Nigeria.

Cape Verde are the fairy-tale story of the qualifiers, and their 1-0 win over Cameroon in their decisive Group D clash in Praia in September means they need just three points from their final qualifiers away in Libya and at home to Eswatini. They would become the second-smallest country, after Iceland, to participate in the World Cup, but their secret has been tapping into a large diaspora on top of the 600,000 locals.