Is Semenyo going to AFCON? All the Premier League players leaving for Morocco next weekplaceholder image
Is Semenyo going to AFCON? All the Premier League players leaving for Morocco next week | Getty Images
From Semenyo to Mbeumo - the Premier League players going to AFCON and staying in England.
The Africa Cup of Nations 2025 kicks off on 21 December when host nation Morocco face Comoros in Rabat – and a number of Premier League stars will leave their teams for a month or more to compete for the greatest prize in African football.
Players have to be released from club duty by 15 December at the latest and the final takes place on 18 January – full details of the dates players might leave from and return by can be found here – meaning that several sides could be without key players for an extended period.
But who’s going, and who will be staying put in the Premier League? We look at all of the key players heading to Morocco below.
Bryan Mbeumo & Mohamed Salah among big names confirmed to be off to AFCON
At the time of writing, 10 of the 24 competing nations had confirmed their 28-man squads for the tournament, with the remaining teams compelled to submit their final squad list by Thursday 11 December.
That means that there are a number of players who could leave whose fate remains uncertain – for instance, Everton’s Adam Aznou, who has three caps for Morocco, doesn’t yet know whether he’ll be on the flight to his home country or whether he will miss out on a spot in the final squad.
A full list of first-team Premier League players who could be called up can be found here, but several players already know that they’ll be involved – with perhaps the biggest names being Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah and Manchester United’s Bryan Mbeumo.
With Salah now dropped from the Liverpool squad for their Champions League match against Inter Milan after his public outburst over the weekend, his departure may be more of a relief for Arne Slot than anything else, but United will likely miss Mbeumo quite sorely as they try to build up a head of steam in the Premier League.
Elsewhere, Brentford know that record signing Dango Ouattara has been called up by Burkina Faso as expected, Brighton will lose Carlos Baleba and Sunderland will have to get by without impressive young midfielder Noah Sadiki – one of up to seven players that could leave over the next month, the most in the top flight. Reinildo Mandava’s involvement has also been confirmed after Mozambique named their squad.
Manchester City’s Omar Marmoush, West Ham’s Aaron Wan-Bissaka, Burnley’s Lyle Foster and Axel Tuanzebe and two more Sunderland players - Arthur Masuaku and Bertrand Traoré - round out the list of players who will definitely miss time for AFCON, with more names to follow as squads are announced over the week.
Why Antoine Semenyo, Mohammed Kudus & Yoane Wissa won’t be going anywhere
Not every big-name African player in the Premier League will be leaving, however – in fact, perhaps the most in-form African in the top flight, Bournemouth’s Antoine Semenyo, is among those who won’t be going to AFCON at all.
Semenyo will stay put because Ghana, who have been drawn against England in next year’s World Cup group stage, failed to reach the tournament after a disastrous qualifying campaign in which they failed to win a single match against Angola, Sudan and Niger.
That failure means that Mohammed Kudus will also remain in the Premier League, much to Tottenham Hotspur’s relief, while Brighton & Hove Albion’s Yankuba Minteh is another high-profile player who won’t take part after Gambia also failed to make it through to the finals.
Injuries could also keep several players from joining their national squads, with Spurs’ Yves Bissouma, Crystal Palace’s Ismaïla Sarr and Nottingham Forest’s Ola Aina all beset by injury worries which could prevent them from taking part – although Aina, who hasn’t played since September, has been named in Nigeria’s expanded provisional squad.
One key player who won’t be at AFCON for fitness reasons is Newcastle United’s Yoane Wissa. The forward sustained an injury shortly after signing for his new club and only made his debut towards the end of the recent 2-1 win over Burnley. The Democratic Republic of Congo chose not to call him up due to his lack of match fitness, making him one of the most high-profile players to miss out.
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