{"id":572245,"date":"2026-08-02T20:01:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-02T20:01:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/572245\/"},"modified":"2026-08-02T20:01:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-02T20:01:08","slug":"2026-womens-africa-cup-of-nations-ghizlane-chebbak-drives-moroccos-push-for-a-breakthrough-title","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/572245\/","title":{"rendered":"2026 Women\u2019s Africa Cup of Nations: Ghizlane Chebbak drives Morocco\u2019s push for a breakthrough title"},"content":{"rendered":"

Morocco\u2019s patient rise to the top<\/p>\n

Morocco\u2019s rise in the last decade is evident in their presence on the big stage. Playing their first international match in 1998, the\u00a0Atlas Lionesses\u00a0have had to bide their time.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Despite playing in the first two editions of the\u00a0Women\u2019s Africa Cup of Nations<\/a>\u00a0(WAFCON), exiting in the group stages on both occasions, their return to the competition wouldn\u2019t come until 2022.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Their time away resulted in necessary investment from their federation, which in turn saw steady growth on the pitch to develop a team capable of challenging.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the first of what is set to be three consecutive occasions hosting the tournament, Morocco finished runners-up. It was bittersweet to come so close, but a real demonstration of just how far they had come.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Three years later in the 2024 edition \u2013 held in 2025 \u2013 they repeated that feat, this time falling to 10-time title winners Nigeria at the last hurdle.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

In between, they competed at their maiden FIFA Women\u2019s World Cup tournament in 2023, shocking many as they reached the round of 16, finishing ahead of Germany to progress.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t just the senior side reaping the rewards of continued support, either.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Work has gone into grassroots football across the country, too, with different development programs focused on finding the next generation of\u00a0Atlas Lionesses.\u00a0As a result,\u00a0participation numbers skyrocketed<\/a>, with 5,000 registered players turning into 60,000.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t luck, nor is it a coincidence \u2013 this is the reward of hard work and investment that has gone into bringing Morocco up to speed, as their captain emphasises.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are a lot of people who see the results that Morocco has achieved now, and they think it\u2019s by coincidence, they are surprised by the results,\u201d Chebbak said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the result of years and years of hard work. It took years to get here. It\u2019s not by chance. I lived in a time when there was nothing dedicated to women\u2019s football and now there is everything\u2026 but we still have more to do.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Morocco\u2019s patient rise to the top Morocco\u2019s rise in the last decade is evident in their presence on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":572246,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[85,46,105],"class_list":["post-572245","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572245","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=572245"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572245\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/572246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=572245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=572245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=572245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}