Ghana draw bye in 2022 World Cup qualifiers

Derrick Elorm Adzokpa Sports News Jul - 30 - 2019 , 08:47

The draw for the preliminary round of the African qualifiers for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar was held yesterday with Ghana and other top ranked teams on the continent drawing bye and heading into the next phase of the quaifying rounds next March.

Yesterday’s draw in the Egyptian capital of Cairo involved the 28 lowest-ranked sides in accordance with the FIFA Coca-Cola July ranking and the matches will take place from September 2 to 10.

The draw also featured six teams out of the 24 teams which participated at the just-ended Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) tournament, namely: Burundi, Tanzania, Guinea-Bissau, Zimbabwe, Angola, Namibia.

Two teams out of the six which featured at the AFCON will also face each other as Burundi clash with Tanzania, while Zimbabwe, Namibia, Angola and Guinea-Bissau face Somalia, Eritrea, The Gambia and Sao Tome e Principe respectively.

The 14 countries which qualify over the two legs and the 26 countries which drew a bye will be split into 10 groups of four after a fresh draw with the first matches scheduled for March 2020.

The group winners will go into five two-leg playoffs in November 2020, with the winners qualifying for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.

The fixtures of the 2022 FIFA World Cup preliminary round draw for Africa are as follows:

Ethiopia v Lesotho

Somalia v Zimbabwe

Eritrea v Namibia

Burundi v Tanzania

Djibouti v Eswatini * (formerly Swaziland)