Football: How will 2025 Africa Cup of Nations affect the Bundesliga - Full list of players set to depart for Morocco
by Devesh Jaganath | by Devesh Jaganath
2025 Africa Cup of Nations: Dates, Teams and Format
Morocco will host the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations, and the tournament is scheduled to run between December 21 and January 18, marking a shift from the norm, where in previous years the competition used to kick off in January and run through February.
One major reason for the change in the AFCON timetable is due to the new UEFA Champions League setup, where the final two Matchdays of the League Phase of the competition are set for the end of January. Don’t forget to check out our Champions League predictions for Matchday 5 this week.
Since the 2019 edition of the AFCON, the tournament has been expanded to 24 teams from 16 in previous years. The competition proper will feature six groups consisting of four teams each, with the top two from each group progressing to the round of 16. The 24 participating nations are:
- Group A: Morocco, Mali, Zambia, Comoros
- Group B: Egypt, South Africa, Angola, Zimbabwe
- Group C: Nigeria, Tunisia, Uganda, Tanzania
- Group D: Senegal, DR Congo, Benin, Botswana
- Group E: Algeria, Burkina Faso, Equatorial Guinea, Sudan
- Group F: Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Gabon, Mozambique
Over the years, a total of 15 nations have won the Africa Cup of Nations, with Egypt leading the way with seven titles, followed by Cameroon (5) and Ghana (4). Ivory Coast are the defending champion and are tied with Nigeria on three titles each.
List of Players to depart Bundesliga and Bundesliga 2 for AFCON
With the 2025 AFCON set to get underway on Sunday, December 21, which is also part of Matchday 15 in the Bundesliga, German clubs will likely be missing their African stars for that weekend.
Given that the German top flight has a longer December break than some of the other leagues around the world, the impact of missing players is slightly less than, for instance, the Premier League, which runs full steam through the festive period. Here is a full list of Bundesliga players set to feature at AFCON:
Algeria: Mohamed Amoura (Wolfsburg), Ramy Bensebaini (Borussia Dortmund), Badredine Bouanani (Stuttgart), Fares Chaibi (Frankfurt), Ibrahim Maza (Bayer Leverkusen)
Benin: Andreas Hountondji (St. Pauli)
Burkina Faso: Sacha Banse (Greuther Furth), Cyriaque Irie (Freiburg), Edmond Tapsoba (Bayer Leverkusen)
Cameroon: Leon Bell Bell (Eintracht Braunschweig), Christian Kofane (Bayer Leverkusen), Nathan Ngoumou (Borussia Monchengladbach), Patrick Nkoa (Borussia Monchengladbach)
Comoros: Warmed Omari (Hamburg)
DR Congo: Samuel Essende (Augsburg), Silas Katompa Mvumpa (Stuttgart)
Ivory Coast: Yan Diomande (RB Leipzig), Silas Gnaka (Magdeburg), Bazoumana Toure (Hoffenheim)
Mali: Ibrahima Cisse (Schalke), Amadou Haidara (RB Leipzig), Ibrahim Sissoko (Bochum), Ibrahima Sissoko (Bochum), Moussa Sylla (Schalke)
Morocco: Hamza Anhari (Fortuna Dusseldorf), Eliesse Ben Seghir (Bayer Leverkusen), Ayoub Chaikhoun (Nuremberg), Anouar El Azzouzi (Fortuna Dusseldorf), Bilal El Khannouss (Stuttgart)
Nigeria: Dickson Abiama (Kaiserslautern), Kevin Akpoguma (Hoffenheim), Afeez Aremu (Kaiserslautern), Felix Agu (Werder Bremen), Precious Benjamin (Hoffenheim), Victor Boniface (Werder Bremen), Nathan Tella (Bayer Leverkusen), Jordan Torunarigha (Hamburg)
Senegal: Pape Demba Diop (Nuremberg), Christian Gomis (Schalke), Nicolas Jackson (Bayern Munich)
South Africa: Ime Okon (Hannover)
Tunisia: Louey Ben Farhat (Karlsruhe), Mohamed Drager (Eintracht Braunschweig), Ismael Gharbi (Augsburg), Elias Saad (St. Pauli), Ellyes Skhiri (Eintracht Frankfurt)
Zambia: Lubambo Musonda (Magdeburg)
