Newly appointed Ivorian head coach, Emerse Fae, isn’t getting ahead of himself despite leading Cote D’Ivoire to the 2023 AFCON title.
Fae replaced Jean -Louis Gasset as interim head coach during the 2023 AFCON after back to back losses to Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea respectively.
Under Fae’s leadership, Cote D’Ivoire went on a brilliant run that ended in The Elephants winning its third AFCON title beating Nigeria, Senegal and Mali en route to the title.
Fae was elevated to the substantive head coach status after the AFCON title win and in his opening presser, the former Cote D’Ivoire international preached a cautious approach.
“For me, I want to take things step by step. I am the coach of the Ivory Coast national team, and I want to celebrate winning the AFCON. We have a tough task ahead in the 2026 World Cup qualifiers, and we are keeping our eyes on Morocco’s achievement in the 2022 Qatar World Cup.”

On Fae’s appointment, Ivorian Football Federation President Idriss Diallo said, “Emerse was until now interim coach and has just been confirmed as full coach”.

Gasset has since been appointed as Olympique Marseille head coach after Gennaro Gattuso’s sacking.