African drums fail to beat in World Cup

World
Europe

01:54

With none of the non-Europeans team making it to the final four, the 2018 FIFA World Cup has turned out to be a graveyard for the non-European champions and stalwarts.

But for the continent of Africa, it’s one of the worst World Cup campaign ever. Five Africans team had qualified for the finals, but none of them could go past the opening round or the group stage.

If a just-in-time recovered Mohamed Salah couldn’t live up to the expectations with a winless campaign for Egypt, the four other teams from the continent – Morocco, Nigeria, Tunisia and Senegal failed to sail into the second round or the knock out stage.

Nigeria team ahead of their match against Argentina, Group D match. /VCG Photo

Morocco suffered a shocking defeat at the hands of Iran in their opening game due to an own goal towards the fag end of the match but they narrowly lost to Portugal before holding a formidable Spain, who eventually bowed out of the tournament after the first round, in their final group league game.

Their African counterparts, Tunisia had a nightmarish campaign as well after they were comprehensively beaten by two of the stalwarts in the group Belgium and England.

Nigeria, however, showed their brilliance and flair on the field and gave a tough time to Croatia & Argentina before losing to them and missing the bus for the second round.

The fifth team in the lot were Senegal, who, due to a complicated fair-play rule -- which says the team with less number of yellow cards will move into the second round, missed the grade too.

But they did win hearts even though the age-old saying of “nothing succeeds like success.”