Didier Drogba's prediction yesterday that we may be about to see the first African winner of the World Cup, may not be as far fetched as it sounds.

Brazilian great Pele predicted that an African nation would win football's premier tournament before the turn of the Millennium yet Cameroon's quarter-final appearance in 1990 when they were knocked out by England, remains the best achievement by any team from the continent.

Drogba's Ivory Coast already hold one World Cup record and the Chelsea striker firmly believes they are now ready to make waves in South Africa next summer.

“The Elephants” as they are known, are the only team in the tournament's history to have scored in every game they have played in the finals.

True, they have only appeared once, in Germany three years ago, but they acquitted themselves well in a tough group beating Serbia 3-2 and losing to both Argentina and Holland 2-1.

The country has built on that first experience of World Cup football and, although they only finished fourth in the 2008 African Cup of Nations, their qualifying campaign has been a resounding success.

Under new manager Vahid Halilhodzic, who was appointed in May last year, they have scored 16 goals and conceded only four in their five qualifying matches to date — Drogba has six of those including the vital one in the 1-1 draw with Malawi at the weekend that clinched qualification.

Halilhodzic, 56, who was linked with the Portsmouth manager's job at the start of the summer, has brought in a new strict regime and has had a positive effect on Drogba.

The Bosnian coach was also a striker, who scored eight goals in 15 matches for the former Yugoslavia and was also twice the leading scorer of the French League with Nantes.

He also has a broad range of coaching experience at Lille, Rennes and Paris Saint-Germain in France and Turkish side Trabzonspor and before moving to the Ivory Coast he was in charge of Al-Ittihad in Saudi Arabia.

Halilhodzic will be taking some well known figures from the European football to South Africa; Drogba and Chelsea team-mate Salomon Kalou, Emmanuel Eboue from Arsenal and Kolo Toure. There is also Toure's brother Yaya from Barcelona, while former Tottenham midfielder Didier Zokora who is now at Sevilla.

But there is also Marseille's Bakary Kone and Feyenoord's Sekou Cisse who both have three goals in qualifying; Nice midfielder Emerse Fae, who spent a season at Reading is also emerging as a central midfielder of growing stature and ability.

Ladbrokes have Ivory Coast at 33-1 to win the tournament and Halilhodzic is confident his squad has the depth to compete with the best and warned: “We are very proud to participate in the World Cup for the second consecutive time and this time it is going to be better.”