Paul Moss

There'd been street protests sparked in part by anger at the vast sums Morocco is spending to host the tournament.

Not to mention resentment from within African football about its timing.

Rob Stephens from BBC Sports Africa is there watching the football and soaking up the atmosphere.

There was very much a mood of celebration before the game, a brilliant opening ceremony with a light show inside the ground and fireworks inside the stadium bowl as a large Africa Cabin Nations trophy was lifted, you know, descended even, I should say, from the skies into the centre circle and really one of Moroccan pride because the Crown Prince Moulay El Hassan was in attendance and the

The cheers that he got when he stepped onto the pitch in the teeming rain were quite something to greet the teams before the kick-off.

And it's a mood of expectation here in Morocco.

They think that they will be claiming this trophy come the 18th of January and the final back here in Rabat.

That sounds like plenty of razzmatazz then for the opening ceremony.

But there has been criticism within Morocco, indeed angry protests at people who feel like, well, this is not a rich country.

We need more money spent on things like health care and maybe not so much on such an extravagant tournament.

Yes, and a lot of the spending is also with an eye on co-hosting the 2030 FIFA World Cup alongside Spain and Portugal.

Some $5 billion has been spent, partly hosting this tournament.

A large amount of money of the $5 billion is being spent on a 115,000-seater stadium in the countryside outside of Casablanca near Ben Slimane.

And there have been protests, partly on the amount of money

of money that's being spent on football with the Gen Z 212 protesters calling for more money to be spent on health and education instead.

And with the football itself, there's also been anger by some of the nations taking part in the tournament, I gather, because they feel they weren't given enough time to get their teams ready for the matches.

Yeah, very much so.

It's been squeezed into the calendar here in December, being played over Christmas and New Year for the first time.

And usually ahead of these tournaments, clubs should release players 14 days before the first game.

This time around, it was seven days.