{"id":443069,"date":"2017-12-02T15:30:30","date_gmt":"2017-12-02T15:30:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ghana-mma.com\/2017\/12\/02\/desailly-backs-africa-for-2018-world-cup-semis\/"},"modified":"2017-12-02T15:30:30","modified_gmt":"2017-12-02T15:30:30","slug":"desailly-backs-africa-for-2018-world-cup-semis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2017\/12\/02\/desailly-backs-africa-for-2018-world-cup-semis\/","title":{"rendered":"Desailly backs Africa for 2018 World Cup semis"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div id=\"medsection1\">\n<!-- End of html generated by this->header() --><\/p>\n<p class=\"floatLeft\">Sports News of Saturday,  2 December 2017<\/p>\n<p class=\"floatRight\"><strong>Source: <\/strong>Goal.com <\/p>\n<p>2017-12-02<\/p>\n<div class=\"article-left\">\n<p class=\"article-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ghanamma.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/14597933.295.jpg\" alt=\"Desailly55\" title=\"Desailly55\" width=\"295\" height=\"157\" \/><span class=\"image_caption\"><span>Desailly has tipped an African country to reach the last four of the 2018 Fifa World Cup<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"noPrint\">\n<div id=\"537626303\" style=\"width:300;height:250;margin:0;padding:0\">\n<p>\t\t  <noscript><iframe loading=\"lazy\" id=\"b2ad7fa7fd\" name=\"b2ad7fa7fd\" src=\"http:\/\/ghanaweb-d.openx.net\/w\/1.0\/afr?auid=537626303&amp;cb=151125813921649\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" width=\"300\" height=\"250\"><a href=\"\/\/ghanaweb-d.openx.net\/w\/1.0\/rc?cs=b2ad7fa7fd&amp;cb=151125813921649\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t  <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ghanamma.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/1512228630_237_ai\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a><\/iframe><\/noscript><\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p style=\"clear:right\">Former France captain of Ghanaian descent Marcel Desailly has tipped an African country to reach the last four of the 2018 Fifa World Cup.<\/p>\n<p>Nigeria, Senegal, Morocco, Egypt and Tunisia have been confirmed as the five teams to represent the continent in Russia next year.<\/p>\n<p>Africa&#8217;s best position since debuting in 1934 has been quarter-final berths achieved by Cameroon, Senegal and Ghana in 1990, 2002 and 2010 respectively.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;My native Ghana did not get into the final part,\u201d Desailly told Sport Express Russia.<br \/>&#13;<br \/>\n\u201cThis is my spiritual wound. But other African teams are able to surprise.<\/p>\n<p>\u201dAnd Nigeria, which has a strong squad, and the Arab countries \u2013 Tunisia, Egypt.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPerhaps, the moment has come when a team from Africa will finally reach the semi-finals.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the final draw conducted on Friday, Egypt &#8211; the first African country to play at the World Cup &#8211; have been placed in Group A, alongside hosts Russia, Uruguay and Saudi Arabia.<br \/>&#13;<br \/>\nMorocco find themselves in Group B, which also contains Portugal, Spain and Iran.<\/p>\n<p>Nigeria are set to play Argentina in the group stage for the fifth time as both sides made Group D. Iceland and Croatia are the other teams of the group.<\/p>\n<p>Tunisia have England, Belgium and Panama to battle in Group G, while Senegal, who are set to return to the global showpiece for the first time since debuting in 2002, will square off against Poland, Colombia and Japan in Group H.<\/p>\n<p><!-- uploaded by: 58 updated by: -1 --><\/p>\n<p><!-- Start of html generated by this->footer() -->\n<\/div>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<a style=\"display:none\" rel=\"follow\" href=\"http:\/\/megatheme.ir\/\" title=\"\u0642\u0627\u0644\u0628 \u0648\u0631\u062f\u067e\u0631\u0633\">\u0642\u0627\u0644\u0628 \u0648\u0631\u062f\u067e\u0631\u0633<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sports News of Saturday, 2 December 2017 Source: Goal.com 2017-12-02 Desailly has tipped an African country to reach the last four of the 2018 Fifa World Cup Former France captain of Ghanaian descent Marcel Desailly has tipped an African country to reach the last four of the 2018 Fifa World Cup. Nigeria, Senegal, Morocco, Egypt [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":403952,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-443069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Desailly backs Africa for 2018 World Cup semis - Ghanamma.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2017\/12\/02\/desailly-backs-africa-for-2018-world-cup-semis\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Desailly backs Africa for 2018 World Cup semis - Ghanamma.com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Sports News of Saturday, 2 December 2017 Source: Goal.com 2017-12-02 Desailly has tipped an African country to reach the last four of the 2018 Fifa World Cup Former France captain of Ghanaian descent Marcel Desailly has tipped an African country to reach the last four of the 2018 Fifa World Cup. 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