The Togolese national football team coach, Paulo Duarte, has resigned, ending a three-year relationship with the team.
Duarte resigned amid the national team’s struggle in the 2026 World Cup qualifiers, which has made football lovers panic that the team may be unable to repeat the 2005 achievement that made the country play its first FIFA World Cup in 2006 having been coached throughout the qualifying campaign by Nigeria’s late coach, Stephen Keshi.
The country’s football federation confirmed the development to newsmen on Friday, through a statement.
According to the statement: “The Executive Committee regrets this decision but takes note of it and wishes to express its gratitude to him for his work, commitment and professionalism during the years of collaboration.
No specific reason has been given for the Portuguese’s decision, but he failed to qualify the side for the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations and they currently languishing in fourth on their World Cup qualification pool, seven points behind leaders Sudan and five behind powerhouse Senegal.
Only the top team in each of the nine pools advance automatically to the finals in the United States, Mexico and Canada.
