WC Countdown: Best 11 Africans playing for other teams

During the whole history of the World Cup, no African nation has ever won the trophy. The closest anyone got to the final was Morocco, who lost in the semi-final and then finished as fourth at the World Cup 2022, held in Qatar. One of the reasons for this was certainly a lack of quality for some African teams. And yet, if they were better in recruitment, maybe they would be much, much better placed at the FIFA‘s biggest competition. We already stated that there are around 73 players (numbers may vary as not all teams have the final lists) with African origin who play for other national teams (Mainly France and England). And if all of them (or at least majority) played for their countries of origin (or countries of their parents), nations like Nigeria, Dr Congo or Ghana would be among the favorites!

WC Countdown: How many Africans are in other teams?

Can you imagine a team in which, alongside Lookman and Osimhen there are players like Eze, Madueke, Saka, Musiala, Olise, Akanji and Alaba? Or what if DR Congo came to the USA with Mateta, Kalulu, Camavinga and Tielemans in the squad? Ivory Coast already has a formidable team but they would surely be stronger with Marc Guehi, Jonathan Tah, Desire Doue and Manu Kone. With so many Africa-connected footballers in other national teams, it would be interesting to create the best 11 out of those 73 players. As there are so many excellent midfielders among those men, we decided to field a team in a 4-2-3-1 formation.

Our ideal 11 Africans in non-African teams in this World Cup would look like this:

GK: Brice Samba – Rennes (DR Congo)

Defense: Malo Gusto – Chelsea (Angola), Antonio Rudiger – Real Madrid (Siera Leone), Dayot Upamecano – Bayern Munich (Guinea-Bissau), Nuno Mendes – PSG (Cape Verde)

Midfield: Eduardo Camavinga – Real Madrid (Angola/DR Congo), Rayan Cherki – Manchester City (Algeria), Desire Doue (Ivory Coast), Ousmane Dembele - PSG (Mali/Mauritania), Lamine Yamal – Barcelona (Equatorial Guinea/Morocco)

Attack: Kylian Mbappe – Real Madrid (Cameroon/Algeria)

The choice was much toughter than it looks. Let‘s look at the players who were left on the bench, and we will mention just the ‘bigger‘ names:

Defence:

Ibrahima Konate – Without club (Mali)

Alphonso Davies -Bayern Munich (Liberia/Ghana)

Manuel Akanji – Inter Milan (Nigeria)

David Alaba – Without club (Nigeria)

Malick Thiaw – Newcastle (Senegal)

Marc Guehi – Manchester City (Ivory Coast)

Jonathan Tah – Bayern (Ivory Coast)

Ezri Konsa – Aston Villa (Congo/Angola)

Jarell Quansah – Liverpool (Ghana)

Djed Spence – Tottenham (Kenya)

The midfield looks even toughter:

Michael Olise – Bayern Munich (Nigeria/Algeria)

Bukayo Saka – Arsenal (Nigeria)

Noni Madueke – Arsenal (Nigeria)

Eberechi Eze - Arsenal (Nigeria)

Jamal Musiala – Bayern (Nigeria)

Felix Nmecha – Dortmund (Nigeria)

Amadou Onana – Aston Villa (Senegal/Cameroon)

Manu Kone (Ivory Coast)

Youri Tielemans – Aston Villa (Congo)

Kobbie Mainoo – Manchester (Ghana)

N'Golo Kante – Fenerbahce (Mali)

Leroy Sane – Galatasaray (Senegal)

Nico Williams – Bilbao (Ghana)

Bradley Barcola - PSG (Togo)

Rafael Leao – AC Milan (Angola)

Attackers are just as fearful, even though Kylian Mbappe was the obvious choice to start in this first 11:

Alexander Isak – Liverpool (Eritrea)

Romelu Lukaku – Napoli (Congo)

Jean-Philippe Mateta (DR Congo)

Noah Okafor – Leeds (Nigeria)

Folarin Balogun – Monaco (Nigeria)

Breel Embolo – Rennes (Cameroon)

Tim Weah – Marseille (Liberia)

WORLD CUP - GROUP STAGE

First round

Thursday, 11.06.

22.00: (1.50) Mexico (4.00) S.Africa (7.25)

Friday, 12. 06.

05.00: (2.70) S.Korea (3.10) Czech R. (2.75)

22.00: (1.85) Canada (3.70) B&H (4.25)

Saturday, 13.06.

04.00: (2.05) USA (3.35) Paraguay (3.80)

22.00: (12.0) Qatar (5.40) Switzerland (1.28)

Sunday, 14.06.

01.00: (1.62) Brazil (3.80) Morocco (5.80)

04.00: (6.80) Haiti (4.45) Scotland (1.47)

07.00: (4.50) Australia (3.50) Turkey (1.83)

20.00: (1.03) Germany (15.0) Curacao (50.0)

02.00: (2.10) Netherlands (3.45) Japan (3.50)

***odds are subject to change***