Equatorial Guinea fail in appeal against World Cup forfeits

Emilio Nsue won the golden boot at Afcon 2023 but a row over his eligibility has cost Equatorial Guinea six points in 2026 World Cup qualifying

Equatorial Guinea's appeal to overturn a points deduction for fielding an ineligible player in two 2026 Fifa World Cup qualifying wins has been turned down by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (Cas).

The Central Africans beat both Namibia and Liberia 1-0 in November 2023 but Fifa awarded their opponents technical 3-0 wins six months later because the National Thunder fielded Emilio Nsue, who scored the winner in both games.

To the surprise of many, football's world governing body declared in May 2024 that Nsue was ineligible to play for Equatorial Guinea despite the forward having appeared regularly for the national side over the previous decade.

At the time, Fifa said it was "comfortably satisfied" that Nsue - who had won the golden boot at the Africa Cup of Nations just three months earlier - had never received clearance to formalise his switch from Spain, who he had represented at youth level.

After Fifa officially cleared Nsue to play for the Equatoguineans in March this year, the country's football federation (Feguifut) appealed for the return of the six World Cup qualifying points it had forfeited.

Such a scenario would have been crucial to Equatorial Guinea's hopes of reaching the a first World Cup, given they would have moved from fifth place up to second in Group H, whose automatic berth for the 2026 finals has already been secured by Tunisia.

However, the ruling by Cas, sport's highest legal body, means that second place in the group - which could secure qualification for a continental play-off round - remains in Namibia's hands.

With just two qualifiers left, the Brave Warriors' 15 points are four better than Liberia, who have also benefited from Cas' decision.

Malawi and Equatorial Guinea are both on 10 points, with all four of those nations still able to finish second in the group.

The group stage of Africa's 2026 World Cup qualifying campaign wraps up next month, with the winner of November's continental play-offs going through to a final inter-confederation qualifier in March next year.

Technicality stymies Equatorial Guinea appeal

The Court of Arbitration for Sport, based in Lausanne, Switzerland, dismissed the appeal by Equatorial Guinea's football federation

Quite aside from Fefuifut's decade-long infringement, Cas ruled that its appeal was inadmissible in any case because of an administrative issue - in that it had failed to include the Namibian FA (NFA) and Liberian FA (LFA) in the appeal.

Fifa had argued that the views of both FAs needed to be heard as "their legal interests would be directly affected by any ruling that alters the outcome of the forfeited matches".

"Since the appeal is directed solely at Fifa and does not name the NFA and LFA as co-respondents, the [Cas] panel concludes that the appeal must be dismissed," the Cas ruling, which is dated 28 July but which has only recently come to light, stated.

Feguifut had argued in vain that this procedural oversight should not have affected the outcome of the case.

In its arguments to Cas, Fifa ventured its decision to only sanction Feguifut by forfeiting points against Namibia and Liberia was "extremely lenient" as it "could have imposed the exclusion from the ongoing World Cup qualifiers".

Nsue was cleared to play for his family's homeland earlier this year after Feguifut proved to Fifa that Equatorial Guinea's constitution states that anyone born to a mother or father from the country is automatically an Equatoguinean upon birth.

The 35-year-old's father is from Equatorial Guinea.

Moreover, the former Middlesbrough and Birmingham City player - who has not just captained the National Thunder but also become the team's record goalscorer - bore the country's passport before he played youth internationals for Spain for the first time in 2005.

Feguifut thus contended that the 2026 World Cup qualifying points should have been returned since Nsue had always been eligible to play for Equatorial Guinea, and that Fifa's decision to rule him ineligible shortly after his National Thunder debut in 2013 was wrong.

Nonetheless, the country flouted regulations by fielding the forward on over 40 occasions prior to receiving official clearance from Fifa for him to play six months ago, with the decision having "no retroactive effect".

In between this decision and the original Fifa verdict of 2013, Nsue had played in qualifiers for both the 2018 and 2022 World Cup campaigns, which are run by football's world governing body, and played at three separate Africa Cup of Nations tournaments.