After gaining independence from France in 1960, Senegal's national team began playing officially the following year. Although the Lions of Teranga won the Amilcar Cabral Cup – a tournament contested by West African nations between 1979 and 2007 – on 8 occasions, true domestic success would elude them until 2021, when they lifted the Africa Cup of Nations for the first time. On the global stage, Senegal became the second African team to reach the quarter-finals of the FIFA World Cup, which they did so during their first appearance in 2002.
