For those that don’t tend to watch a lot of the Africa Cup of Nations, it can feel as though something crazy is always happening in that tournament.
It isn’t exactly outrageous to suggest that it doesn’t come close to the top of the agenda for many English football fans, the majority of whom would be keener to watch the Euros or the World Cup, but it is a great opportunity for African football to be given the spotlight for a change.
Whilst Premier League fans are mostly just annoyed their players have to leave midway through the season and hope no one gets injured, the players at AFCON want to win, which is what makes what happened in 2025 all the madder.
The Competition Itself
The 35th edition of the Africa Cup of Nations was hosted by Morocco between the 21st of December 2025 and the 18th of January 2026. It was the second time that Morocco had acted as hosts of AFCON, having also done so in 1988, but it wasn’t supposed to be them hosting it initially. Instead, that honour had been given to Guinea, but it was taken away from them when it was clear that inadequate preparations had been made for the country to host a tournament of this size.
Having chosen the official match ball and the song for the tournament, everyone was hoping for an excellent showcasing of African football without any controversy.
The group stage saw Morocco and Mali make it out of Group A, Egypt and South Africa emerge from Group B, Nigeria, Tunisia and Tanzania qualify from Group C, Senegal, DR Congo and Benin make it through Group D and Algeria, Burkina Faso and Sudan come through Group E.
They were joined by Ivory Coast, Cameroon and Mozambique from Group F, with Mali, Senegal, Egypt, Ivory Coast, Algeria, Nigeria, Cameroon and Morocco making it through the round of 16.
The semi-finals then saw Senegal play Egypt and win 1-0, whilst Nigeria lost 4-2 to Morocco on penalties, winning the third-place play-off in the same manner.
The Final
In terms of finals, you aren’t going to see many that are as mad as what happened at AFCON in the January of 2026. Played at Morocco’s Prince Moulay Abdellah Stadium, Jean-Jacques Ndala of the Democratic Republic of the Congo was given refereeing duties, overseeing a game that ended 0-0 after 90 minutes.
It was in the fifth minute of added time at the end of the game that Senegal seemed to have won it when Abdoulaye Seck appeared to outmuscle Achraf Hakimi and head the ball off the crossbar before Ismaïla Sarr scored, but the referee controversially gave a free-kick to the hosts and ruled out the goal.
Part of the problem was that the referee blew his whistle before play had ended, so the Video Assistant Referee couldn’t get involved. Three minutes later, Senegal conceded a penalty, which led to their manager ordering his players off the pitch and the match being suspended for 14 minutes.
Eventually, Sadio Mané persuaded them to go back onto the pitch, where Édouard Mendy saved the penalty. In extra-time, Pape Gueye scored the only goal of the game as Senegal felt that they had won the tournament, holding on to see out a 1-0 win. What they didn’t realise, however, was that the match wasn’t over even after the final whistle was blown.
CAF’s Intervention
Nearly two months after the final was played, the Confederation of African Football decided to get involved in things and declared that Senegalese players’ decision to leave the pitch meant that they had essentially forfeited the match. Instead of the 1-0 Senegal win that most people thought had happened, CAF instead announced that the game would be recorded as a 3-0 win to Morocco, making them the official winners.
The CAF decision came on the back of Morocco making an appeal about the match, which CAF said was ‘declared admissible in form’, saying that ‘through the conduct of its team’, Senegal had triggered Article 82.
Article 82 says that if a team refuses to play or chooses to leave the pitch before the end of normal time without having been given permission to do so by the referee, they will be considered to be the losing team and eliminated, losing 3-0. Of course, things aren’t stopping there.
Senegal have decided to protest against that decision, taking their case to the Court of Arbitration for Sport and deciding to parade the AFCON trophy in front of their supporters prior to their home match against Peru. The country’s Football Federation declared a ‘crusade’ against CAF, rather than accepting the verdict that was meted out.