Victor Osimhen and Bryan Mbeumo emerged as the talismans Tuesday in Africa’s high-stakes World Cup playoff semifinals, their red-hot form injecting electric tension into clashes that could crown a ninth continental qualifier for the expanded 2026 tournament in the United States, Canada and Mexico.
Nigeria’s Galatasaray sharpshooter Osimhen, fresh from a Champions League hat-trick against Ajax and topping Europe’s elite scorers with six goals, headlines the Super Eagles’ assault on Gabon, while Mbeumo’s blistering four-goal burst in Manchester United’s recent Premier League surge positions him as Cameroon’s spearhead against a depleted Democratic Republic of Congo.
The semifinals unfold Thursday at the Prince Moulay Abdellah Stadium here, with winners advancing to Sunday’s decider for a shot at the intercontinental playoffs next March against Central American foes, joining Bolivia, New Caledonia and either Iraq or the UAE for two remaining slots.
Nigeria coach Eric Chelle, the Ivorian tactician boasting four wins and two draws since taking the reins, gushed over his marquee marksman: “I love Victor. He is the best striker in the world.”2f359e Yet he tempered the hype with caution: “It will be very difficult in Morocco,” acknowledging Gabon’s unbeaten streak of eight wins and a draw as the top runners-up from the 10-group qualifiers.
Osimhen’s Benin treble last month clinched Nigeria’s second-place finish on goal difference over Burkina Faso, paving this path, while two-time African Player of the Year Ademola Lookman lurks as his lethal partner in crime.
Cameroon’s Indomitable Lions, Africa’s most frequent World Cup guests with eight prior trips, lean on Mbeumo’s predatory edge after a goalless Angola stalemate left them four points shy of Cape Verde’s shock group triumph. Belgium-born boss Marc Brys eyes his October Premier League Player of the Month to translate club magic to the Maghreb.
Gabon, ranked 88th to Nigeria’s 52nd, counters with LAFC’s Denis Bouanga — an African Player of the Year nominee who bagged eight qualifiers — and 36-year-old Marseille veteran Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, whose seven strikes underscore this potential swan song. Bouanga radiated defiance: “We have discovered many new players, and the team now has a solid core. Gabon are capable of achieving great things.”
The DRC, stung by a Senegal collapse that dashed group-topping dreams, arrives shorn of Newcastle’s injured winger Yoane Wissa, tilting the scales toward Brys’s side as slight favourites.
With Algeria, Cape Verde, Egypt, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Morocco, Senegal, South Africa and Tunisia already through as group winners, Thursday’s duels promise a narrative of redemption and revelation, where Osimhen’s aerial menace and Mbeumo’s clinical cool could etch African football’s next chapter in Morocco’s storied sands.
