Cameroon became only the fourth country to lift the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (Wafcon) title following Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea and South Africa, and only the third to have both a men’s and women’s continental champion, after a 3-0 win over Malawi in Rabat last weekend. The result was significant for several reasons, not least because it gave the competition a new winner after the former champions Nigeria and South Africa were eliminated in the quarter-finals to mark a changing of the guard in the African women’s game. It is worth remembering that Cameroon did not directly qualify for this edition of the Wafcon and were only added when the tournament was expanded to 16 teams last November.
That gave them the opportunity to compete, but almost no one would have picked them as champions based on reputation and results. Cameroon had not reached a Wafcon final in a decade and had never even scored a goal in the final, but had three before half-time against a Malawi side that seemed destined to complete a fairytale. As debutants and the lowest-ranked team at the event in 153rd place, Malawi scorched their way into the final, in the process confirming a first World Cup appearance in Brazil next year.
Malawi and Cameroon will be joined by Morocco and Algeria, who have qualified for the global event for the first time. Two months ago, the former Cameroon goalkeeper Valentine Nguele, who holds a Confederation of African Football (Caf) A coaching licence, was appointed as the national team’s first female coach. She came with a strong record after being part of the support staff at Louves Minproff that won the Cameroonian first division title five times between 2011 and 2020 and was also an assistant coach with FC Ebolowa, who won the title in 2024 and 2026.
My style is participative and engaging.” Under Nguele, Cameroon became a focused and clinical side, which they demonstrated by topping their group. In the quarter-finals they beat the 10-time champions Nigeria, then the hosts, Morocco, in the semi-final and, finally, Malawi. In the process Nguele became the fifth female coach to win Wafcon.
By contrast Nigeria failed to make the semi-finals for the first time. Worse was to come as they lost 2-1 to South Africa in their World Cup playoff, meaning they will be absent from the tournament for the first time. The Nigerian Football Federation subsequently sacked Justine Madugu and his entire technical team and announced plans to set up a taskforce to investigate the national team’s failure.
Another team who will be disappointed with their performance at Wafcon are Morocco, who participated in the previous two finals and would have hoped for third time lucky in front of their home fans. They were particularly poor in penalty shootouts, scoring once in four attempts against Cameroon in the semi-finals and twice in five against Algeria in the third-place playoff. The Cameroon goalkeeper Michaely Bihina won the competition’s golden glove for her ice-cold performances between the posts.
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