Ok so we all know the likes of Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Nigeria, Ghana, Egypt, etc are perrenial favorites for the Nations Cup and the winner will in all likelihood come from among these. But football being the way it is always throws up surprises and in tournaments of this nature, one of the not-too-fancied teams typically rises to the challenge and impresses. Who could it be this time?

Mali with their underlying potential? Zambia and their youthful side? How about Angola and their resilience...or indeed Sudan and their unpredictability?

If I'm to be biased, I'd say Zambia will cause a few upsets. But speaking objectively, the likes of Mali and Angola could just turn out to be the dark horse in this tournament.

If they weren't in Egypt's group, I would've said Sudan .
I have high expectations for Angola, they have two players from Ahly .

I got a feeling morocco will do well, they played well in their friendlies prior to the tournie, i would have said mali too if they can get out of their group

I think Mali could do good they have Kanoute and other quality players that plays in top clubs in europe, and maybe Zambia or Angola....

I agree, Sudan could be a surprise

Morrocco and Mali 4 sure will be the black horses if we dont consider Morrocco 2 be one of the favourites.
IMO Morrocco has bigger chances than Egypt

They're neither black horses nor hot favourites. They're too popular to be black horses and recently too inconsistent to be hot favourites.

Hmmm..............


.......no

The Pharaoh dont forget that winnin the last cup just dont put u among hot favourites.
u must also keep the streak and the performances and the form , plus last time when Egypt won it , it was in Egypt which gave them an advantage 2 win it.
Morrocco showed great improvement and they are more settled now with Henri Michelle so there are higher expectations than last cup.

To be fair Pharaoh if the qualifying matches for this tournament were anything to go by, then Morocco's chances are definitely brighter than Egypt's. But of course qualifying for the tournament and actually playing in it are two different things so Egypt can do better than in the qualifiers...and frankly they need to if they are to hold on to their crown.

I'm not sure about Morocco being dark horses...I guess I would classify them as semi-favourites...I mean it would be less of a surprise if they went on an amazing run in the tournament compared to say, Mali or Zambia. But yeah Morocco do have what it takes to have a great tournament.

To be honest the actual tournament is totally different than the qualifications. For example, take Tunisia and Sudan - who do you think has the better chance of winning the tournament? Of course most people will say Sudan, yet Tunisia came behind them in the qualifications. Another example is the qualifications of the 2006 World Cup in Germany, (Nigeria - Togo, Angola - Senegal)nuff said about that already. However, I totally agree about Egypt's underperformance in the qualifications. And Mahdiano, I'm not saying that Egypt are one of the favourites simply because they won the last cup - we're talking about Egypt here, no one can deny that Egypt will remain as one of the biggest forces in Africa, and that the chances of us lifting the title in every tournament are not small. It is true that having the fans' support last time was a huge advantage, but dont forget we won the tournament four times before, three outside the homeland. And although it wasn't shown in the qualifications, we can actually perform in away matches. Egypt vs. Cameroon in the last World Cup qualifications says it all.

I agree Morocco is a great team and i do not rate them as Black horses.

the black horse for this cup will be Guinea of course.