Radio France International’s Portuguese site gives an excellent breakdown of how Lusophone Africa’s national teams are looking heading into their final Africa Cup of Nations qualifying games.
Mozambique has the best chance of the Portuguese-speaking nations, sitting in second place in Group F even with Cape Verde on four points. Their first match will be a difficult road test against last-placed Rwanda, a tough team defensively with two points who still harbor faint qualifying hopes of their own. RFI interviews Mambas coach Luís Gonçalves who indicates that the team believes they are capable but are concerned about missing French-based defenders Mexer and Reinildo. Mozambique will close out their campaign with a home match against Cape Verde that will likely have high stakes.
The Djurtus of Guinea-Bissau are cursing their luck at having six players unavailable due to their being based in France but still have a fighting chance of achieving qualification, their games against Group I leaders Senegal over with. A win against Eswatini on the road in their next match will be necessary and then an opportunity likely awaits to steal qualification from Congo-Brazzaville at home in the final game.
Angola and São Tomé and Príncipe are eliminated from the qualification picture, both sitting in last place. São Tomé and Príncipe host Sudan on Wednesday in Group C action while Angola look to play spoiler at Gambia on Thursday.
