{"id":3477,"date":"2025-12-30T21:50:51","date_gmt":"2025-12-30T21:50:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/home\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16"},"modified":"2025-12-31T03:07:05","modified_gmt":"2025-12-31T03:07:05","slug":"drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/sport\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16","title":{"rendered":"DRC Beats Botswana 3-0, Reaches AFCON Last 16"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"ap-summary\" dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">\n<h4>What You Need to Know<\/h4>\n<p>The Democratic Republic of Congo triumphed over Botswana with a decisive 3-0 victory in the final group stage match of the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations held in Morocco. This win secured Congo&#8217;s place in the Round of 16, showcasing their strong performance throughout the tournament. Key players contributed significantly to the victory, demonstrating their potential as contenders in the competition.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><span class=\"ap-article-header-tag\"> <strong>Africa. <\/strong> <\/span>The Democratic Republic of Congo achieved a resounding victory over Botswana, winning 3-0 in the third and final group stage match of the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations held in Morocco. This win secured their advancement to the Round of 16 in the tournament.<\/p>\n<p>Fiston Mayele, a forward for Pyramids FC, started the match for Congo before leaving the field in the 89th minute.<\/p>\n<p>Congo opened the scoring in the 31st minute through Nathaniel Mboko, who received a brilliant back-heeled pass inside the penalty area and finished with a shot to the left of the goalkeeper into the net. Gae\u0308l Kakuta doubled the lead in the 41st minute with a successfully executed penalty kick, and he added a third goal in the 60th minute, capitalizing on a low cross inside the box and firing it powerfully into the net for his second goal of the match.<\/p>\n<p>In the 63rd minute, Fiston Mayele scored a fourth goal, but the referee disallowed it after reviewing the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) due to a handball by the player. With this victory, the Democratic Republic of Congo increased their points tally to 7, finishing second in the group, equal on points with Senegal, who topped the group after defeating Benin 3-0. Botswana, on the other hand, officially exited the tournament, finishing at the bottom of the standings without any points.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"HIGHLIGHTS | Botswana ? DR Congo | #TotalEnergiesAFCON2025 - Group D\" width=\"696\" height=\"392\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/djCVEb2wriQ?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) is the main international football competition in Africa, organized by the Confederation of African Football (CAF). Established in 1957, it has grown to feature numerous teams from across the continent, showcasing the best of African football talent. The tournament is held every two years, with the 2025 edition taking place in Morocco, highlighting the country&#8217;s capacity to host major sporting events.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ap-article-footer-note\">Find more news and analyses on <span class=\"ap-highlight-country\">Africa<\/span> on the <span class=\"ap-highlight-brand\">Africa Press<\/span> website<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What You Need to Know The Democratic Republic of Congo triumphed over Botswana with a decisive 3-0 victory in the final group stage match of the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations held in Morocco. This win secured Congo&#8217;s place in the Round of 16, showcasing their strong performance throughout the tournament. Key players contributed significantly [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":3476,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[79],"tags":[763,120,826,287,112,720],"class_list":{"0":"post-3477","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sport","8":"tag-afcon","9":"tag-africa","10":"tag-botswana","11":"tag-congo","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-tournament"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>DRC Beats Botswana 3-0, Reaches AFCON Last 16 - Africa Press English<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Congo secures a 3-0 victory over Botswana, advancing to the AFCON 2025 knockout stage with a strong performance.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/sport\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"DRC Beats Botswana 3-0, Reaches AFCON Last 16\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Congo secures a 3-0 victory over Botswana, advancing to the AFCON 2025 knockout stage with a strong performance.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/sport\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Africa Press English\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-12-30T21:50:51+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-12-31T03:07:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/africa-home\/sites\/69\/2025\/12\/sm_1767150138.554065.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1005\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"727\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/sport\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/sport\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"DRC Beats Botswana 3-0, Reaches AFCON Last 16\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-12-30T21:50:51+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-12-31T03:07:05+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/sport\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16\"},\"wordCount\":383,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/sport\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/africa-home\/sites\/69\/2025\/12\/sm_1767150138.554065.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"AFCON\",\"Africa\",\"Botswana\",\"Congo\",\"Football\",\"tournament\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Sport\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/sport\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/sport\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/en\/sport\/drc-beats-botswana-3-0-reaches-afcon-last-16\",\"name\":\"DRC Beats Botswana 3-0, Reaches AFCON Last 16 - 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