Ivorians start Nations Cup campaign against Togo

Ivory Coast's Wilfried Bony (R) celebrates his goal during their quarter-final soccer match of the 2015 African Cup of Nations against Algeria in Malabo

Ivory Coast will start their defence of the Africa Cup of Nations against Togo in January, according to the draw made Wednesday.

Ivory Coast, who beat Ghana on penalties in the 2015 final, are in Group C against Togo, Morocco and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Hosts Gabon, who saw political turmoil after a disputed election in August, will stage the opening match in Libreville on January 14 against Guinea-Bissau, who make their first appearance in the 16-nation tournament.

Cameroon and Burkina Faso are also in Group A.

The other group favourites, Algeria and Ghana, start against Zimbabwe and Uganda respectively.

Algeria have the toughest first round in Group B where they also take on Tunisia and Senegal for one of the two qualifying places for the quarter-finals.

Ghana are the team to beat in Group D. Apart from Uganda, they will take on Egypt, making their return to the contest after missing three finals, and Mali.

The final is in Libreville on February 5. The draw produced three groups containing three of the top 10 ranked football nations in Africa, according to Fifa.

Algeria (2), Senegal (3) and Tunisia (4) are in one mini-league, Ivory Coast (1), DR Congo (6) and Morocco (10) in another and Ghana (5), Egypt (7) and Mali (9) in a third.

A lot of teams will get to know each other extremely well, too, as Ivory Coast and Morocco also share a 2018 World Cup qualifying group, as do Ghana, Egypt and Uganda.

Ivory Coast were not impressive in qualifying, drawing three of four matches against Sierra Leone and Sudan, and Morocco are probably a team they wanted to dodge.

The Moroccans are coached by Herve Renard, the charismatic Frenchman who masterminded the Ivorians’ triumph in Equatorial Guinea last year.

He then left for a brief, unsuccessful spell in the French Ligue 1 before being hired by Morocco.