African Cup of Nations: Seeding for Gabon/Equatorial Guinea 2012 qualifiers (17 January 2010)

The draw for the 2012 ACN qualifiers will take place a couple of days after the final of ACN 2010, probably after February 3rd, the day of the first FIFA ranking release for 2010.

With 51 members and 14 places available, CAF will probably use a system with 12 groups of 4 teams and one with 3 teams, with the winners and the best runner-up from groups of 4 teams qualifying.

These are the groups (in 2006 there was no actual draw - see the seeding and draw procedure used in 2006) based on matches up to and including January 17th.

Group 1: Côte d'Ivoire, Congo, Madagascar, Sao Tome e Principe
Group 2: Egypt, Cape Verde Islands, Lesotho, Central African Republic
Group 3: Cameroon, Gambia, Burundi, Guinea-Bissau
Group 4: Algeria, Senegal, Chad, Djibouti
Group 5: Nigeria, South Africa, Swaziland, Somalia
Group 6: Ghana, Uganda, Sierra Leone, Mauritius
Group 7: Tunisia, Sudan, Ethiopia, Seychelles
Group 8: Burkina Faso, Rwanda, Botswana, Comoros
Group 9: Benin, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Eritrea
Group 10: Mali, Guinea, Libya, Niger
Group 11: Mozambique, Morocco, Congo DR, Mauritania
Group 12: Togo, Angola, Namibia, Liberia
Group 13: Malawi, Zambia, Tanzania

There are plenty of questions though.

1. Will CAF use the same formula as in 2006?
   
2. Will points from the first WCQ group stage be included in the formula?
3. Will South Africa be awarded 6 points for WC participation?
4. How will CAF fix the anomaly created by Togo's withdrawal (i.e. fewer points for Group B teams)?
5. Will all 51 members compete in the qualifiers? If at least 3 members don't enter the qualifying rounds, we'll probably see 12 groups of 4 teams with the winners and the top two runners-up joining the hosts in 2012.

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Christian, husband, father x 3, programmer, Romanian. Started the blog in March 2007. Quit in April 2018. You can find me on LinkedIn.