Will South Africa qualify for the 2026 World Cup?

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Photo by Fauzan Saari on Unsplash

The South Africa men’s senior team has not qualified for the World Cup since 2010 when they hosted the competition. That’s 15 years and 3 straight tournaments where we have not seen the Bafana Bafana on the biggest stage. It’s surely a long, long time. Will that change this time around or will South Africa miss out on 4 World Cup editions in a row? That’s the question we will be answering in this article.

As you probably already know, the 2026 World Cup will be held in the US, Canada, and Mexico, and South Africans everywhere will love to see their boys flying to Hollywood next year to represent the continent. And I mean, wouldn’t it be great for fans to use Hollywoodbets promo code to bet on their team while they’re actually playing in Hollywood? It would surely be poetic. And well, as things stand, that could very well happen because South Africa are currently joint-top of their qualification group.

South Africa beat Benin Republic, Zimbabwe, and drew against Nigeria in the first round of Group C games to secure 7 points out of a possible 12. If they can replicate these results in the second round of fixtures, manage to get a positive result in the second leg against Rwanda, and win both outstanding games against neighboring rivals Lesotho, that should be their World Cup ticket in the bag.

But unfortunately, it won’t be that straightforward, it just cannot be. Rwanda will be a very tough fixture. South Africa lost to the East African nation in the first leg and were not even able to score a goal, so the return leg will not be easy at all.

There’s also the small issue of the game against Nigeria. Every South African is aware of the rivalry between these two countries. They’ve met 13 times in their history and the Bafana Bafana has only managed to win once. That’s a poor record, so most South Africans are not very confident about that game.

And what makes it a little more scary is that the Super Eagles of Nigeria currently have their backs against the wall as they are at risk of missing out of the World Cup, so that fixture in September would be something of a decider, surely a must-watch.

But here’s the thing, South Africa has their own destiny in their hands. If they win all their games from here on, they will certainly secure automatic qualification to the 2026 World Cup. 

If they falter and end up finishing 2nd, it’s not over. 4 of the 9 second-placed teams will go to the playoffs, but only one of those 4 teams will represent Africa in the inter-confederation playoffs, so to be 100% safe, South Africa will be aiming for the top spot and nothing less.

Can they achieve it? We believe they can. They had a brilliant start to the qualifiers, and if they keep up the pace until the end, then America awaits!