DR Congo squad suffers a blow ahead of 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifiers as Hibernian FC defender Rocky Bushiri pulled out of the squad on Monday.
Rocky Bushiri, who only featured for the first 16 minutes against ten-man Motherwell in Hibs 0-1 loss to Motherwell in the Scottish Premiership, walked off injured, but coach Sebastien Desabre included him in the 26-man FIFA World Cup squad following injury details unknown.
DR Congo Federation confirmed his omission from the squad in a press release on Tuesday morning, May 20. Bushiri has been replaced by Kilmarnock defensive midfielder Aaron Tshibola, who is 31 years old.
Rocky Bushiri featured for the Leopards during last year’s 2025 Africa Cup of Nations qualification campaign as they were eliminated by Algeria in the Round of 16. They have since qualified for the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
2026 will be Congo’s first appearance at the World Cup finals since 1972, when they became the first sub-Saharan African country to qualify for the competition. At the time, the country was known as Zaire.
Bushir, who played for Belgium at the youth level, has seven caps and one goal for the DR Congo national team,m Leopards.
He will sadly miss his debut at next year’s World Cup taking place in Mexico, Canada and the USA as DR Congo were drawn in Group K with Portugal, Uzbekistan and Colombia.
