Bafana Bafana's huge win over Morocco could elevate the men's senior national team back into the top 10 teams on the continent in the next FIFA world rankings in July.
Bafana were 2-1 winners at FNB Stadium on Saturday against the continent's top ranked country and the weight of that victory will be evident when the next FIFA rankings are released on July 20.
READ | Broos 'very happy' with Bafana's win over Morocco
The Atlas Lions arrived with their top stars Achraf Hakimi (PSG) and Hakim Ziyech of Chelsea and were beaten before a partisan crowd – the biggest to watch Bafana at FNB in recent years.
After becoming the first nation to reach the semi-finals of the World Cup (2022), the Moroccans have moved to position 11 on the FIFA rankings and are the best team on the continent ahead of Senegal.
While both Bafana and the North Africans have already qualified for the AFCON finals from Group L, the bonus for Broos' men is that they will make further progress on the rankings and gain them a seeding advantage when the AFCON finals draw is held.
With six groups of four teams at the tournament in Ivory Coast from January 13 to February 11, the top six ranked teams at the time of the draw will be seeded.
At present, the top six (according to the latest FIFA rankings) that have qualified are Morocco, Senegal, Tunisia, Algeria, Egypt, and Nigeria while the second tier has Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Mali, South Africa with Ghana and Cameroon due to join this group.
Fourteen countries have already secured their tickets to the AFCON finals and apart from those ranked above Bafana there is Zambia joined by Guinea Bissau, Cape Verde, and Equatorial Guinea.
Namibia will go through if the avoid defeat against Burundi in Dar es Salaam on Tuesday with the other nine places to be concluded in September.
Bafana – who remain unbeaten at home since Broos took over in May 2021 – are also currently sitting on their best FIFA ranking since 2018.
Broos' men are 66th in the world and number 12 in CAF.