With the end of the group stage competitions in the African Cup of Nations currently held in Morocco, the path to the semi-final round has become clear.
Five Arab teams have secured their qualification for the round of 16, which enhances their chances of winning the cup that has eluded Arabs in the last two editions.
Indeed, this edition may witness a unique historical event, represented by the possibility of four Arab teams reaching the semi-final round for the first time.
In the round of 16, the Tunisian team will meet its Malian counterpart, and the winner between them will face the winner of the Senegal-Sudan match in the quarter-finals, on January 9th at the Tangier stadium.
In contrast, the Egyptian team will play against Benin in the same round, and the winner of this match will meet the winner of the Ivory Coast-Burkina Faso match, in the quarter-finals scheduled for the 10th of the same month in Agadir.
As for the Moroccan team, they will face Tanzania in the next round, and if they win, they will wait in the quarter-finals for the winner of the South Africa-Cameroon match, on the 9th at the Moulay Abdellah stadium in Rabat.
In the fourth path, the winner of the Algeria-Democratic Republic of Congo match will meet the qualifier from the Nigeria-Mozambique encounter, in the quarter-finals on the 10th in Marrakesh.
Thanks to this distribution in the tournament schedule, the opportunity has become available to achieve a purely Arab semi-final, as there are no direct Arab-Arab matches in the quarter-finals except in one possible case between Tunisia and Sudan, which opens the door to achieving an unprecedented achievement in the history of the tournament.
