The Confederation of African Football (CAF) has finalized the details for the continental play-off tournament, a critical stage designed to determine which African nation will advance to the FIFA Intercontinental Play-Off for a chance to secure the continent’s potential tenth spot at the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
The Road to the Play-Off
Africa’s World Cup qualification process begins with its 54 nations divided into nine groups of six teams. The nine group winners will automatically qualify for the 2026 World Cup.
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The suspense then shifts to the runners-up. The four best runners-up across all nine groups will earn a place in the centralized CAF Play-Off Tournament.
How the Best Runners-Up are Determined:
To ensure fairness when comparing teams from groups that may have different strengths, a key rule is applied: when ranking the second-placed teams, results against the bottom-placed team (or any withdrawn team) in each group will not count. The final rankings for the best runners-up will then follow the official FIFA tie-break criteria.
The Centralized Play-Off Format
The crucial three-match knockout tournament will take place in Morocco, a decision officially communicated by CAF to all Member Associations.
Tournament Seeding:
The four participating teams will be seeded based on the October FIFA Rankings.
Team 1: The highest-ranked nation.
Team 2: The second highest-ranked nation.
Team 3: The third highest-ranked nation.
Team 4: The lowest-ranked nation.
The official FIFA rankings released at the end of October will be used specifically for this seeding.
Match Schedule and Rules:
The proposed dates for the centralized tournament are:
Semifinals: November 13
Final: November 16
The stadiums are yet to be confirmed.
The matches will follow a single-leg knockout format with strict rules to determine a winner:
If the score is tied after 90 minutes, Extra Time (two 15-minute halves) will be played.
If the teams are still level after extra time, the winner will be decided by a Penalty Shootout.
Teams will be allowed six substitutions in total (five in regular time, plus one additional substitute if the match goes into extra time).
The Knockout Bracket:
The seeding determines the semifinal matchups:
Semifinal 1: Team 1 (Highest Rank) vs. Team 4 (Lowest Rank)
Semifinal 2: Team 2 vs. Team 3
Final: Winner of Semifinal 1 vs. Winner of Semifinal 2
The team that triumphs in the final will not automatically qualify for the World Cup but will earn the right to represent Africa in the final hurdle: the FIFA Intercontinental Play-Off.
The entire continent will be watching, hoping the play-off winner can secure a spot and allow Africa to have its maximum possible representation of ten teams at the 2026 FIFA World Cup.