Cameroon

The Cameroon national football team is one of the most powerful in African continent. In has the 59th position in the FIFA World Rankings. The team played its first match after gaining independence in 1960 against Djibouti and won 9-2.

In 1990 World Cup the team successfully left the group stage and reached the quarter-final. At that time Roger Milla, one of the most experienced team players, was the captain. On the group stage Cameroon beat Argentina, the defending champion, 1-0. The team defeated Romania in the following game 2-1 but lost to USSR 0-4. Nevertheless that didn’t prevent Cameroon from topping its group. In 1/8 final in play-off the team defeated Colombia 2-1. But then Cameroon lost to England 2-3 in quarterfinal. They became the first African team to reach the quarterfinal in the World Cup. At that time the squad was managed by Valeri Nepomnyaschiy.

Cameroon qualified for the next two World Cups in 1994 and 1998 but couldn’t make it out of the group stage. In 2002 World Cup the team showed a good play but didn’t manage to leave the group. The situation repeated in 2010 in South Africa. Nevertheless Cameroon is the only African team which qualified for the World Cup six times.