Namibia came within a whisker of winning the Cosafa u20 Championship in 2020, when they were beaten 1-0 by Mozambique in the final.
They will be looking to go one better when the TotalEnergies CAF u20 Africa Cup of Nations | Cosafa Qualifier takes place from 18 to 27 September.
Six years ago, they qualified for the knockout rounds as the best runner-up after wins over Malawi (2-1) and Comoros (1-0), and a 1-0 defeat to Zambia.
That set up a semi-final against a more fancied Angola side, but Namibia eased to a 1-0 victory to book their place in the decider, where they ultimately fell short against the Young Mambas.
Their run to the final earned them a place at the 2021 u20 Africa Cup of Nations, where they exited in the group stages after taking a single point from their three matches.
They drew their opener 1-1 with Central African Republic before defeats to Tunisia (2-0) and Burkina Faso (2-1).
Namibia would have hoped to build on their strong Council of Southern Africa Football Associations (Cosafa) showing in 2022, but things did not go to plan in Eswatini as they lost to Comoros (1-0), South Africa (5-2) and Malawi (5-2).
They featured in a three-team group in 2024 and again lost both matches, this time to Angola (1-0) and Zambia (2-1), though both were tight contests.
Namibia were hosts in 2025 but won only one of their three matches and again bowed out in the group stages.
This time they have been drawn in group A alongside hosts Mauritius, Mozambique and Seychelles. The top team in each pool advances to the semi-finals along with the best runner-up across the three groups.
Namibia have shown in the past that they are capable of going deep in the competition.
They were the surprise package of the 2010 Cosafa u20 Championship, making it all the way to the final before losing to Zambia.
That was their best-ever result in the tournament until they matched it in 2020, improving on a semi-final appearance in 2007.
They could not repeat the feat when they competed in 2013, though they collected five points from a possible nine to finish second in their first-round pool behind South Africa.
Namibia did not compete at the Cosafa U20 Championship in 2016, 2018 or 2019.
They did feature in 2017, when they beat Angola 1-0 in their opener before a 2-1 defeat to Lesotho and a 0-0 draw with Zimbabwe saw them exit in the first round.
