Qualification
The international qualifiers system allows teams to earn a spot at the final tournament. In qualifying, teams are grouped into zones that roughly correspond to continents, with each zone competing for a fixed number of berths in the final tournament. Some berths are reserved for the host confederation, and others go to the winners of intercontinental play-offs.
Each round is played over two legs. Matches tied after the first leg are decided by goal difference. If the match still remains deadlocked after extra time, penalty shootouts may be used. A team that scores more goals overall advances. Occasionally, matches are played over one leg, for example when a country lacks adequate facilities to host international matches. In such cases, ties that remain deadlocked after 90 minutes will proceed to a replay.
DR Congo, South Africa, Cape Verde, and Tunisia all lead their groups as they aim to qualify for the World Cup. Mohamed Salah’s Egypt, 2022 dark horse Ghana, and 2010 semi-finalist Morocco also have a chance to advance in their respective groups.
Eritrea’s withdrawal from the race means that the group runners-up will be the nations who would have been in pots 1 or 2 for the qualifier draw based on FIFA rankings (and thus automatically qualify). In the finals, each confederation will have three places reserved, and the other four will compete in a two-legged playoff to determine the countries that make up the world’s second-most populated continent’s representation at the finals.