Morocco’s danger man, Ayoub el Kaabi hopes to complete a dramatic rise from a lower league to international football by helping his country defeat Nigeria in the African Nations Championship (CHAN) final on Sunday.
The 24-year-old striker is well known in the North African kingdom before the mid-January kick-off of the biennial tournament which was restricted to African footballers playing in their country of birth.
Now, most African football followers from Cairo to Cape Town know El Kaabi, the 1.82-metre goalmouth predator who has scored a record eight goals in a single edition of the CHAN.
Despite starting only two of three group games, the Moroccan equaled the five-goal benchmark set by Zambian Singuluma in the Ivory Coast nine years ago.
He then raised the bar by opening the scoring in a quarter-final victory over Namibia and bagged a brace as Morocco overcame Libya after extra time to reach the final.
His amazing haul came just a year after he scored 25 goals in 33 matches as Racing Casablanca won promotion to the first division.
Those scoring exploits caught the attention of top-flight outfit Renaissance Berkane, who signed El Kaabi and have been rewarded by 11 goals from him in 17 matches.
Before the fifth CHAN began, most of the talk around the Moroccan attack centered on Achraf Bencharki, the leading scorer for 2017 CAF Champions League winners Wydad Casablanca.
Ayoub el Kaabi expresses his confidence to complete a dramatic rise by helping his country defeat Nigeria
Morocco and Nigeria met in a 2014 CHAN quarter-final with the West Africans overturning a three-goal half-time deficit to triumph 4-3 after extra time in South Africa.
Nigerian Rabiu Ali, at 37 the second oldest 2018 CHAN footballer, scored during that remarkable comeback and is a likely starter against Morocco at the Stade Mohammed V in Casablanca.
His team-mates Anthony Okpotu and Gabriel Okechukwu could trouble the hosts with their huge physiques, pace, and directness, which have already yielded two goals each.
Both finalists qualified with four victories and a draw and Nigeria appear capable of at least running Morocco close in a competition that has produced largely one-sided finals.
It will be recalled that the Democratic Republic of Congo won the 2009 and 2016 title deciders by margins of two and three goals, and Tunisia triumphed by three goals in 2011.
