Nigeria, others to know opponents for AFCON 2025 qualifiers July 4

The Super Eagles of Nigeria will know their AFCON 2025 qualifying group opponents when the draw takes place on Thursday, 4 July 2024, in Johannesburg, South Africa.

This was announced by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) on Thursday.

According to CAF, the draw will be conducted at SuperSport studios in South Africa.

The event will host selected African legends, representatives of the participating teams, and members of the Local Organising Committee for TotalEnergies Africa Cup of Nations Morocco 2025 amongst others.

A total of 48 nations, including the four winners from the preliminary round (Chad, Eswatini, Liberia and South Sudan) will be drawn into 12 Groups of four teams each to battle it out for places at the finals.

Headlining the confirmed nations for the draw are reigning African champions Cote d’Ivoire joined by Algeria, Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burundi, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Congo, DR Congo, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eswatini and Ethiopia.

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Others include Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sao Tome & Principe, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

The qualifiers are scheduled to kick-off in September 2024 to determine the first 24 nations that will compete for Africa’s biggest event in Morocco in 2025.

At the AFCON 2023, the Super Eagles lost 2-1 to hosts Côte d’Ivoire after William Troost-Ekong had opened the scoring.

Meanwhile, it has not been the best of campaign for the Eagles in Group C of the 2026 World Cup qualifiers.

After four games played, the Eagles are yet to record a win, drawing three and losing one.

After draws against Lesotho, Zimbabwe and South Africa, they fell to a 2-1 defeat to Gernot Rohr-led Cheetahs of Benin Republic.

The Eagles currently occupy fifth place on three points in the six-team table, and will resume the World Cup qualifiers in March 2025 with games against Rwanda away and Zimbabwe in Uyo.