ABIDJAN (Cote d'Ivoire) - In four weeks time, on November 26, eight of the sixteen African teams will begin their quest for the five tickets on offer for African teams to the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023.

The first round of Groups A and C of the African Qualifiers will be played from November 26-28 at an African city yet to de determined. It will then resume in February 2022 with eight other teams from Groups B and D bidding their chances to grab one of the five slots for the showpiece in Indonesia, Japan, Philippines.

If recent events in the African basketball landscape are anything to go by, then, the FIBA Basketball World Cup African Qualifiers will be anything but easy for the eternal favourite and highly-ranked teams Nigeria, Tunisia, Angola, Senegal and Cote d'Ivoire, who represented the continent in the China 2019 showpiece.

The 16-team Africa Qualifiers race is wide open, and no team should be underestimated. 

By the time the Africa Qualifiers get underway on November 26, it will be almost three months since Tunisia retained their FIBA AfroBasket title in Kigali, Rwanda.

However, the African Qualifiers bring a different flavour compared to the AfroBasket as the 16 teams will visit several African cities over the course of 15 months (November 2021, February 2022, July 2022, August 2022 and February 2023) to define the continent's five representatives in Indonesia, Japan and Philippines. 

Below, FIBA.basketball brings you a few examples that prove every team has a chance to qualify for the World Cup.

As recently as three months ago, no one expected Uganda to stun Nigeria in the AfroBasket 2021. But it happened.

 
The East Africans' win - probably the most important in their basketball history - not only denied Nigeria a place in the Quarter-Finals, but it also entered the history books as Nigeria's worst result in AfroBasket. Nigeria, the No.1 team in Africa, finished 12th.

How come a team like Cape Verde that had last featured in the FIBA Africa's flagship tournament in 2015 and struggled to reach the AfroBasket 2021, pushed eleven-time African champions Angola to the limits to win 77-71 in overtime before finishing fourth in the Championship?

 
Or even better.

They are a talented and well-coached team, but had anyone expected AfroBasket debutant South Sudan to reach the Quarter-Finals?

Who would have thought that Guinea - one of the lowest-ranked teams on the continent - would beat Egypt in Group B? It was a result that derailed the Egyptian's campaign.

In recent times, South Sudan has become a team to be reckoned with in African basketball

And a look back at the World Cup African Qualifiers 2019 reminds us how competitive the African Qualifiers can become. Not a single team finished undefeated.

And the last ticket for the China 2019 showpiece was only decided in the last window as Cote d'Ivoire rose from the ashes with three straight wins - including an unexpected 72-46 demolition over Nigeria - to return to the World Cup for the first time since 2010.

African basketball lives a new reality not only because of the high number of players displaying their talent in some of the best leagues around the world, but also because of the of the growing popularity of the game on the continent. Highly skilled coaches have become an added bonus to teams looking to put their names on the map of international basketball.  

For the first time in its history, the 32-nation FIBA Basketball World Cup will take place in three different countries, Indonesia, Japan and the Philippines.

 FIBA