Landing in Russia full of expectations, the African teams that qualified for the World Cup quit the competition with a lot of regrets, leaving their fans bitterly disappointed.

In the 2014 World Cup, two teams, Algeria and Nigeria, advanced to the knockout stage although both lost in the round of 16 (versus Germany and France, respectively).

In 2010 (in the World Cup that took place in South Africa) only Ghana made it through the knockout stage, but did so well that it was defeated only in a dramatic quarter final versus Uruguay, decided on penalties.

In the contemporary era (Egypt participated in the World Cup in 1934, being defeated in the first round by Hungary), Africa appeared in the World Cup in 1970 with Morocco and the first sub-Saharan African team, Zaire, in 1974.

However, in the most recent Fifa World Ranking (released on June 7) Tunisia, the first African country, appears in the 21st position, Senegal in 27th, DRC (not participating at the World Cup) 38th, Morocco 41st, Egypt 45th, Ghana (not participating at the World Cup) 47th and Nigeria 48th.

In April 2018, Tunisia reached its highest position in this ranking (14th), while Senegal did it in November 2017 (23rd). In contrast, Morocco, in 1998 was 10th, Egypt, in 2010, was 9th, while Nigeria, in 1994, reached the 5th position.

Why cannot African football establish itself permanently in the elite of the world football? A response to this question may have different explanations.

According to the 2008 Fifa Regulations Governing the Application of the Fifa Statutes (specifically Article 18), “A player is eligible to play for several representative teams due to nationality; he may, up to his 21st birthday, and only once, request to change the Association for which he is eligible to play international matches to the Association of another country of which he holds nationality.”

In practice, this means that a player of African descent born and raised in Europe, although having played at the youth level with a European national team may, nevertheless, decide to play for the national football team of his African country of origin.

Looking at the squads of the five African teams World Cup 2018 a, several players in each team have been born, raised and trained as footballers in Europe.

Therefore, in principle, they should constitute a value added to the African national teams. The Senegalese players K. Koulibaly, S. Sane, Y. Sabaly, A. N’Diaye, M. Sow, M. Niang (all born in France) and K. Balde (born in Spain); Nigerians B. Idowu (born in Russia), W. Troost-Ekong (born in the Netherlands), L. Balogun (born in Germany); the captain of Morocco, M. Benatia (born in France) and his mates born in the Netherlands (H. Ziyech, S. Amrabat and few others); the vice-captain of Tunisia W. Khazri (born in France); the Egyptian S. Morsy (born in England) are among the African players at the World Cup.

However, their contribution has not been as decisive as expected.

Historically, lack of organisation, reflected in different ways, in the various domestic football federations, has influenced the poor performance of African teams at the World Cup.

One problem is certainly the lack of long-term technical vision among the federations.

For instance, Nigeria, in the past four years, has changed its coach eight times, finally finding some stability with the German G. Rohr, who guided the Eagles in the past two years (but will he stay after the elimination at the World Cup?)

The Frenchman H. Renard, with previous coaching experiences in Africa, has been at the head of Morocco since 2016 while N. Maaloul took the helm of Tunisia only in 2017.

In contrast, both Egypt and Senegal have had their current coaches for three years (but H. Cuper, Argentinian coach of Egypt, has already resigned after the failure at the World Cup).

Another problem, linked to the previous one, is the message given by the fact that, more than 50 years after the end of colonialism, the majority of coaches in Africa are still non-African: Three teams (Egypt, Morocco, Nigeria), out of five in this World Cup were coached by non-African coaches and, more generally, the presence of foreign coaches in Africa is often perceived as a way of producing talent exclusively for the West.

Thus, many major European clubs have installed football academies in Africa – FC Barcelona recently joined the group – where they raise talent who can be “exported” to Europe as soon as they are believed to be “ready” by the non-African coaches sent to supervise them.

In addition, African domestic leagues are not valued, with some exceptions (like the South African Premier Soccer League).

This means local infrastructure is poorly developed. Often, a good player has no alternative but to migrate. National federations are trying to partially remedy this situation, regularly organising stages only for players playing in the national championships.

In addition, the Confederation of African Football inaugurated in 2009, a new tournament, the African Nations Championship (CHAN), won in 2018 by Morocco.

It is played between the best national teams of Africa and exclusively features players who are active in the domestic leagues and qualified to play in the ongoing season.

The creation of CHAN was a clear response to the desire to strengthen national competitions regularly weakened by the mass exodus of top players abroad, playing for foreign teams paying more and receiving more media coverage.

Another problem with African football is the waning of patriotism, regularly visible during the African Cup of Nations (CAN: the more important tournament for national teams at the continental level), that, played until 2017 in January, has often been missed by several of their most representative players, who have preferred to remain to play for their clubs in Europe.

In December 2016, at the moment of the composition of the final squad for the 2017 tournament, the then coach of Cameroon (the Belgian E. Gerets), the team that finally won the cup, faced the refusal of seven European-based players to be part of the national squad.

Last but not least, corruption is still a problem, in African football as in Africa in general. Thus the case of Nigeria: “The country lacks organisation, especially in the sports industry,” said Kene, a Nigeria-born football tactics writer.

“We should obviously be investing in it, but money is the main problem due to corruption and greed. The issues plaguing Nigeria have tended to bleed into football as well.”
All these are all long-standing problems in African football, but passionate African supporters continue to hope that their teams will perform better in the World Cup than in the previous editions.

Cristiano D’Orsi is a research fellow and lecturer at the South African Research Chair in International Law, University of Johannesburg Eastern & Southern Africa.