Afcon qualifiers: Winning home games is key, Amavubi coach says
Wednesday, April 20, 2022

The national football team coach Carlos Ferrer has said Amavubi will be looking to make the most of home advantage when they start the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers. 

The tournament will be held in Ivory Coast from 23 June to 23 July 202.

Amavubi is pooled in Group L of the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers alongside defending champions Senegal, Mozambique, and Benin.

Qualifying for the continent’s biggest showpiece will be the first priority for Carlos Ferrer.

"Our first target will be to win home matches and try to get points away. We have to be strong at home and take all points from our side, we know Senegal is the favorite as champions but other teams also are very good but we have to be ready,” Carlos Ferrer said

The top two teams from each of the 12 groups will qualify for Africa's biggest tournament.

History in the last 30 years shows no team has ever managed to earn 12 points from group stages and fail to qualify for the finals.

Ferrer has admitted that winning away matches in Africa is very difficult but it will be very important if Rwanda wins all their home games.

"For us, we have our points target. We know what we feel will take us to the Africa Cup of nations and three points now is three points closer to that,” an optimistic Ferrer explained.

Rwanda will be looking to amass a minimum of 12 points which could qualify the country to the 2023 AFCON since no team has failed to make it to the continent’s most prestigious football tournament with 12 points in the qualifying campaign in more than three decades.

The last time Rwanda qualified for the tournament was in 2004.

Since then it has been a tale of missed chances that has claimed many coaches on the way. One of the major reasons for the failure to qualify for a major competition is the lack of proper youth structures.

The 2023 Africa Cup of Nations (also referred to as AFCON 2023 or CAN 2023) is scheduled to be the 34th edition of the Africa Cup of Nations, the biennial international men's football championship of Africa organized by the Confederation of African Football (CAF).