CAF qualification World Cup 2022 simulations (April 2021)

Africa's qualification process for the World Cup next year in Qatar is not too complicated but (as usual) with little margin for error:

• first a play-off round to whittle the number of teams down to 40. These play-offs were already played in September 2019.
• then a second round consisting of 10 groups of 4 teams, with two match days to be played in the June, September and October windows this year. The ten group winners progress to 
• round three with five home-and-away play-offs to determine the 5 African participants in Qatar. These play-offs are to be played in November this year and the 10 teams in the draw will be seeded according to the FIFA October 2021 ranking.

Although the match schedule for the second qualifying round is still not officially confirmed, nor by FIFA, nor by CAF, the first two group matches are scheduled for the upcoming June window next month. Don't know why it's taking them this long to publish a simple match schedule, when the draw for this round was already more than a year ago...

On wiki I found a match schedule but without source. Of course I'm curious myself what the always tightly contested African qualification could bring. So I decided to simulate this match schedule.

Here are the probabilities (in %) -generated over 10.000 simulations- with all match results based on NT prediction formula's for goals scored in a match depending on elo win expectancy.

First the qualification groups. The teams are ordered by average position in the group.

 

group A	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Algeria	83,60	15,95	0,45	0,00
Burkina Faso	16,11	79,50	4,37	0,02
Niger	0,29	4,54	92,06	3,11
Djibouti	0,00	0,01	3,12	96,87
group B	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Tunisia	73,23	19,49	5,77	1,51
Zambia	18,63	43,39	25,20	12,78
Mauritania	4,67	20,09	35,34	39,90
Equatorial Guinea	3,47	17,03	33,69	45,81
group C	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Nigeria	87,53	10,49	1,66	0,32
Cape Verde Islands	9,18	52,03	25,99	12,80
Liberia	1,88	20,51	37,36	40,25
Central African Republic	1,41	16,97	34,99	46,63
group D	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Cote d'Ivoire	63,61	30,08	5,52	0,79
Cameroon	32,29	51,19	13,65	2,87
Malawi	3,41	13,68	51,91	31,00
Mozambique	0,69	5,05	28,92	65,34
group E	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Mali	58,34	26,43	11,35	3,88
Uganda	24,77	36,05	26,12	13,06
Kenya	12,78	25,09	35,35	26,78
Rwanda	4,11	12,43	27,18	56,28
group F	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Egypt	70,61	19,82	7,03	2,54
Gabon	15,55	35,77	28,35	20,33
Angola	7,36	23,05	33,23	36,36
Libya	6,48	21,36	31,39	40,77
group G	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Ghana	63,84	23,97	9,30	2,89
South Africa	22,26	38,26	25,55	13,93
Zimbabwe	9,91	24,34	36,46	29,29
Ethiopia	3,99	13,43	28,69	53,89
group H	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Senegal	95,21	4,30	0,45	0,04
Congo	2,19	41,07	33,32	23,42
Namibia	1,99	35,60	35,38	27,03
Togo	0,61	19,03	30,85	49,51
group I	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Morocco	83,08	12,86	3,34	0,72
Guinea	8,98	39,13	30,38	21,51
Sudan	4,74	26,95	34,35	33,96
Guinea-Bissau	3,20	21,06	31,93	43,81
group J	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Congo DR	41,03	30,88	18,74	9,35
Benin	37,33	31,54	20,71	10,42
Madagascar	15,60	23,86	33,29	27,25
Tanzania	6,04	13,72	27,26	52,98

The top dogs appear to win their groups easily. Group D could be exciting with two favourites in it. Groups E and J are without an outspoken favourite.

Then the qualification for the play-off round. The top 5 play-off participants are seeded (based on the October 2021 ranking), the other 5 are unseeded. Below you see the probabilities to qualify as seeded or unseeded, the probability to be seeded given that a team is a group winner and the total probability to qualify for the play-offs. Teams are ordered by this last column.

team	seeded	unseeded	%seeded	total
Senegal	95,21	0,00	100,00	95,21
Nigeria	87,43	0,10	99,89	87,53
Algeria	83,60	0,00	100,00	83,60
Morocco	82,52	0,56	99,33	83,08
Tunisia	73,23	0,00	100,00	73,23
Egypt	30,59	40,02	43,32	70,61
Ghana	17,50	46,34	27,41	63,84
Cote d'Ivoire	11,75	51,86	18,47	63,61
Mali	5,48	52,86	9,39	58,34
Congo DR	0,80	40,23	1,95	41,03
Benin	0,03	37,30	0,08	37,33
Cameroon	6,79	25,50	21,03	32,29
Uganda	0,01	24,76	0,04	24,77
South Africa	0,15	22,11	0,67	22,26
Zambia	0,03	18,60	0,16	18,63
Burkina Faso	4,51	11,60	28,00	16,11
Madagascar	0	15,60	0	15,60
Gabon	0,03	15,52	0,19	15,55
Kenya	0	12,78	0	12,78
Zimbabwe	0	9,91	0	9,91
Cape Verde Islands	0,15	9,03	1,63	9,18
Guinea	0,18	8,80	2,00	8,98
Angola	0	7,36	0	7,36
Libya	0	6,48	0	6,48
Tanzania	0	6,04	0	6,04
Sudan	0	4,74	0	4,74
Mauritania	0,01	4,66	0,21	4,67
Rwanda	0	4,11	0	4,11
Ethiopia	0	3,99	0	3,99
Equatorial Guinea	0	3,47	0	3,47
Malawi	0	3,41	0	3,41
Guinea-Bissau	0	3,20	0	3,20
Congo	0	2,19	0	2,19
Namibia	0	1,99	0	1,99
Liberia	0	1,88	0	1,88
Central African Republic	0	1,41	0	1,41
Mozambique	0	0,69	0	0,69
Togo	0	0,61	0	0,61
Niger	0	0,29	0	0,29
Djibouti	0	0	0	0

I've simulated the play-off round by determining the 5 seeds and 5 unseeds in each simulation and perform a random draw to generate the 5 play-off pairings. Also which team in each pairing plays home in the first leg is result of a random draw.

The probabilities to qualify for the World Cup (in square brackets the probability, given qualification for round 3):

team	qualify
Senegal	72,56		[76,21]
Algeria	65,60		[78,47]
Nigeria	62,07		[70,91]
Morocco	57,57		[69,29]
Tunisia	48,60		[66,37]
Egypt	33,93		[48,05]
Cote d'Ivoire	30,86		[48,51]
Ghana	28,22		[44,20]
Mali	20,56		[35,24]
Cameroon	12,63		[39,11]
Congo DR	10,43		[25,42]
Benin	8,59		[23,01]
Burkina Faso	7,44		[46,18]
South Africa	6,38		[28,66]
Uganda	5,70		[23,01]
Zambia	5,36		[28,77]
Gabon	3,43		[22,06]
Madagascar	2,43		[15,58]
Kenya	2,26		[17,68]
Cape Verde Islands	2,21		[24,07]
Guinea	2,18		[24,28]
Zimbabwe	2,09		[21,09]
Angola	1,25		[16,98]
Libya	1,08		[16,67]
Mauritania	0,93		[19,91]
Sudan	0,88		[18,57]
Tanzania	0,67		[11,09]
Ethiopia	0,59		[14,79]
Equatorial Guinea	0,54		[15,56]
Guinea-Bissau	0,53		[16,56]
Malawi	0,52		[15,25]
Rwanda	0,49		[11,92]
Congo	0,36		[16,44]
Namibia	0,35		[17,59]
Liberia	0,33		[17,55]
Central African Republic	0,19		[13,48]
Mozambique	0,10		[14,49]
Togo	0,07		[11,48]
Niger	0,02		[6,90]
Djibouti	0		[0,00]

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About me:

Software engineer, happily unmarried and non-religious. You won't find me on Twitter or other so called social media. Dutchman, joined the blog in March 2018.