Procedures for 2025 AFCON qualifiers draw explained by CAF

Ahead of the official draw of the TotalEnergies CAF Africa Cup of Nations Morocco 2025 qualifiers, the Confédération Africaine de Football (CAF) officially released the draw procedures of CAF’s flagship competition qualifiers.

Set to take place in Johannesburg on Thursday 04 July at 14h30 Local Time (12h30 GMT), the draw will see a total of 48 African nations engaged to determine who qualifies for the 33rd edition of the biggest event on African soil.

The engaged teams will be grouped into four pots of 12.

The highest ranked nations as per the latest FIFA Rankings issued out on 20 June 2024 will occupy Pot 1, with the same procedure to be followed for Pot 2, 3 and 4 to make up the 48 nations.

The concluded draw of the qualifiers will be made up of 12 Groups of 4 teams (Group A to L), where the first and runners-up in the eleven (11) groups that do not involve tournament hosts Morocco, will gain qualification to the competition.

For teams that finish first and second in a group consisting of Morocco, who by virtue of being tournament hosts gain automatic qualification, the following scenarios will be applied:

• If the host is ranked first, the host is qualified in addition to the second of the group.
• If the host is ranked second, the host will qualify in addition to the first of the group.
• If the host is ranked third or fourth, the host will qualify in addition to the first of the group.

TotalEnergies CAF AFCON Morocco 2025 Draw Procedures: 

• The first ball will be drawn from Pot 4 and will go to position A4.
• The procedure will be repeated for the remaining teams of Pot 4 who will go to positions B4, C4, D4, E4, F4, G4, H4, I4, J4, K4 & L4  according to the draw order.
• The same procedure as above will be repeated for Pot 3, Pot 2 and finally Pot 1.

48 African nations to be engaged as per the latest FIFA Rankings issued on 20 June 2024