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Rabat – Pape Gueye’s story about Senegal’s tea evenings during AFCON has spread quickly. In recent comments, Senegal players said they enjoyed “amazing tea” served in “fantastic cups” every evening, but that the royal tea treatment suddenly stopped once Morocco became their opponent in the final.
The storyline line worked at first, turning a complicated AFCON fallout into something simple and easy to picture.
But, as is often the case with untrue or half-true stories, its central narrative about Morocco’s selective hospitality fell apart as soon as actual AFCON footage started to emerge.
When you place the story against actual footage, it looks less like evidence and more like an overcooked narrative.
A video filmed in Tangier before the final shows the opposite of what the initial story suggested: the royal tea treatment for Senegalese players at their designed residence did not stop.
The footage, recorded after Senegal had already qualified for the final, captures a relaxed moment as staff presented tea in the same traditional style described in Gueye’s account.
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In other words, the scene flies in the face of the idea that touching hospitality and royal treatment at the Senegalese players’ residence suddenly stopped once Morocco’s Atlas Lions became their next opponents.
Context matters more than anecdotes
Even without the video, the broader context already pointed in a different direction.
Before the final, Senegal were based in Tangier at the Fairmont Tazi Palace, one of the most high-end hotels in Morocco. The setting was a luxury environment designed to host elite-level teams with full services, privacy, and comfort.
That alone makes the idea of a sudden shift into poor treatment difficult to sustain.
A claim of deliberate withdrawal of hospitality requires stronger evidence than a single anecdote.
The real turning point of the AFCON final did not happen in a hotel or over tea; it happened on the pitch.
Senegal’s players left the field after a legitimate late penalty decision. The match was interrupted as a result. The situation escalated. That sequence triggered a legal process that later led CAF to award Morocco a 3-0 win by forfeit.
That unprecedented, inexcusable walk-off is the event that reshaped the final. Everything else, including stories about tea, sits around it.
Morocco’s treatment of Senegal, based on the available evidence, does not match the image of a team suddenly denied basic hospitality.
Senegal’s Teranga Lions stayed in a luxury base in Tangier, and their pre-final concerns in Rabat were addressed through adjustments. And footage shows that Moroccan hospitality, including the royal tea treatment itself, was still on the menu even after the final pairing was known.
