Morocco and Senegal face decisive CAS hearing over 2025 Africa Cup of Nations final

The dispute over the winner of the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations reaches a crucial stage on Thursday, as Morocco, Senegal and the Confederation of African Football (CAF) appear before the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in Lausanne, Switzerland.

The hearing will examine the circumstances surrounding the final, in which Senegal’s players briefly left the pitch before returning to complete the match. Senegal went on to beat Morocco 1-0 after extra time, but CAF later ruled that Senegal had forfeited the game and awarded Morocco a 3-0 victory.

A panel of three arbitrators will hear submissions from all sides. The case presents CAS with two conflicting outcomes: the score recorded on the pitch and the subsequent legal decision that Senegal should be considered to have lost by withdrawal.

Morocco relies on CAF regulations

Morocco’s case is based on what it describes as a strict interpretation of CAF’s competition regulations. The Moroccan Football Federation argues that any team leaving the field without the referee’s permission must be deemed to have forfeited the match.

CAF’s Appeal Committee relied on Articles 82 and 84 of the tournament regulations when it overturned Senegal’s result in March and registered a 3-0 win for Morocco. The Moroccan side is asking CAS to uphold that ruling and leave the title in its possession.

The Senegalese Football Federation will present its own legal arguments in an attempt to overturn CAF’s decision.

The dispute began during the final after Senegal’s players temporarily walked off in protest at the decision to award Morocco a penalty. They later returned, and Edouard Mendy saved Ibrahim Diaz’s spot-kick before Senegal scored the winning goal in extra time.

However, the legal contest began after the match. On 17 March 2026, CAF’s Appeal Committee ruled that Senegal had lost by withdrawal and awarded Morocco a 3-0 victory, citing the same two regulations.

The fable behind the rivalry

Moroccan sports website Le360 Sport has portrayed the legal battle through the famous French fable The Cicada and the Ant, written by Jean de La Fontaine.

The site described the Senegalese “cicada” as the team that left the pitch before returning, while presenting Morocco as a calmer “ant” that continued to rely on its reading of the regulations.

Senegal’s appeal to CAS has created what Le360 Sport calls another round of the contest, this time without a ball, spectators or video assistant referee technology. Instead, the outcome will be decided through legal submissions, documents and competing interpretations of the rules.

La Fontaine’s fable first appeared in the opening volume of his Fables, published in 1668. It tells of a cicada that spends the summer singing without storing food for winter. When the cold arrives, it asks the ant for grain, but the ant refuses, asking what the cicada did during the summer. “I was singing,” it replies, prompting the ant to answer: “You were singing? Then dance now.”

The story draws on an older tradition associated with Aesop and contrasts the cicada’s failure to prepare with the ant’s work and foresight.