Brussels: Europe and the Arabs
Hopes are now placed on the Atlas Lions team, “Morocco,” to end the stumble that the Arab teams faced in their first matches in the African Nations Championship currently being held in Côte d’Ivoire.
Especially since the Egyptian national team, the country that won the tournament the most, began its campaign with a difficult draw in the last minutes against Mozambique. The Algerian national team also tied in its first match, while Mauritania and Tunisia were defeated at the beginning of the journey, while other teams such as Senegal and Mali appeared with good levels that made some people rush to nominate all of them. Of them to the quarter-finals, although others still have hope that more than one Arab team will advance to the same stage
Therefore, the Arab fans hope that the Moroccan team will succeed in its difficult mission today against Tanzania to end the stumble and renew hope that Arab teams will reach the final rounds.
Moroccan cafes in Brussels and other Belgian cities returned to the atmosphere of the last World Cup, and the cafes prepared to receive members of the Moroccan communities for the match and take to the streets to celebrate any new achievement.
The Moroccan national team enters the “Cannes 2023” finals as one of the most prominent candidates to win the African Nations title, especially after its historic appearance in the 2022 World Cup, where it became the first Arab and African team to reach the semi-finals, before losing to the French national team after it defeated the Spanish national team. Portugal are the favorites to compete for the title.
The “Atlas Lions”, led by its coach, Walid Regragui, are armed with many stars in search of crowning the African title, perhaps the most prominent of whom are Achraf Hakimi, the Paris Saint-Germain star, Yassine Bounou, the Saudi Al Hilal goalkeeper, Hakim Ziyech, the Turkish Galatasaray striker, Izzedine Ounahi, the French Marseille midfielder, and Youssef En-Nesyri. The Spanish star of Sevilla.
The Moroccan national team records its appearance in the 2023 African Cup of Nations, for the nineteenth time in its history, as it participated 18 previous times starting in the 1972 edition and won the title in its second participation in 1976 in Ethiopia, after being eliminated from the first round six times in 7 participations between 2000 and 2013. It succeeded in qualifying for the playoffs in the last three editions.
The last time the Atlas Lions made an appearance in the African Nations final was in 2004, when they lost the title to their Tunisian counterpart, two goals to one.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo national team is scheduled to meet its counterpart, the Zambian national team, at ten in the evening today, Wednesday, at the “Laurent Boku” Stadium, at the conclusion of the first round of the 2023 African Nations.
The Egyptian national team fell into the trap of a draw with Mozambique, with two goals to the same, in the first round of the group stage, in the 2023 African Cup of Nations, which is currently being held in Côte d’Ivoire.
Mustafa Mohamed opened the team's goals in the second minute, before the Mozambique national team scored two consecutive goals to turn the result in their favor, and in stoppage time, Mohamed Salah equalized for the national team from a penalty kick earned by Mustafa Mohamed.
This is the third time in the history of the Egyptian national team's participation that they started the tournament with a draw, as the national team had previously tied in two previous editions.
In the 1976 edition, the Egyptian national team tied with Guinea 1-1 at the beginning of the tournament, and the team succeeded in qualifying and reaching the semi-finals of the tournament in this edition, before finishing the tournament in fourth place.
This is the second time that the national team has started with a draw in the 2017 edition, when the Egyptian national team opened the tournament with a goalless draw with the Mali national team, so that the Egyptian national team continued its path towards the final of the tournament, losing to the Cameroon national team by two goals to one.
The Egyptian national team, led by Rui Vitoria, tied with Mozambique with two goals for each team in the match that took place between them, in the first round of the first round of the African Nations Championship, Côte d’Ivoire 2023.
Today, Wednesday, the Egyptian national team will conclude its training to face Ghana in the second round of Group Two of the African Cup of Nations, which will be held in Côte d'Ivoire and will continue until next February 11.
The Egyptian national team, led by its Portuguese coach Rui Vitoria, needs at least to win one of the next two matches in the second and third rounds with Ghana and Cape Verde, respectively.
In the event of victory in the next two matches, the Egyptian national team will advance to the top of the group. However, in the event that the Pharaohs lose in the next two matches, draw in them, or draw in one match and lose the other, early exit from the group stage will be the fate of the team that has won the most African Nations Cup titles in its history. With 7 titles.