The African continent achieved a historic achievement in this year’s World Cup, as ten teams were able to reach the finals in its expanded edition, a record that highlights the significant growth of African football talent.
The list of qualified teams included illustrious names such as Ivory Coast, Egypt and Ghana, in addition to Morocco and Senegal, which reached the final match in the African Cup of Nations.
Promising teams also appeared on the world stage, such as Cape Verde, most notably the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which clinched the qualification ticket after its dramatic victory over Italy in a playoff match on Wednesday, returning to the World Cup after an absence of 52 years.
This expansion comes in light of FIFA’s implementation of the new system that requires the participation of 48 teams instead of 32, a step that came after years of demands to end the monopoly of European teams. FIFA President Gianni Infantino had previously confirmed that football “is not limited to Europe and South America,” but rather is a global game.
