Spectacular location
The draw will be held outdoors in the Egyptian city of Giza which is located on the west bank of the Nile, near Cairo. The Giza Plateau is home to iconic Egyptian monuments, including 3 tall pyramids built as royal mausoleums around the 26th century B.C. The Great Sphinx is a vast sculpture of a man’s head on a lion’s body. The draw will be held in a picturesque setting in front of these historical monuments.
Pots and seeds
The pots and seeding of the 24 qualified teams were decided based on the latest FIFA World rankings released 4 April 2019.
Pot 1
Egypt, Cameroon, Senegal, Tunisia, Cote D’Ivoire, Ghana
Pot 2
DR Congo, Mali, Morocco, Nigeria, Guinea, Algeria
Pot 3
South Africa, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Angola, Guinea-Bissau, Burundi
Pot 4
Benin, Mauritania, Madagascar, Kenya, Namibia, Tanzania
Legends attending
The Confederation of African Football has confirmed that a number of the continent’s finest ex-stars will be in attendance. They include former Cameroon captain Rigobert Song, Cote d’Ivoire captain Yaya Toure, former Senegal striker El Hadji Diouf, former Egypt captain Ahmed Hassan, former Moroccan midfielder Mustapha Hadji and former Nigeria winger Emmanuel Amunike.
Kick off
Apart from the increase in number of participating countries, the tournament’s previous timing of holding in January-February has been shifted to the summer. Originally scheduled to be hosted by Cameroon, CAF’s decision to strip the central Africans of the hosting rights and hand them to Egypt also necessitated a changed in the original dates. The tournament will now hold from 15 June-13 July to its current dates to allow players to rest after the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
