Cameroon has hosted the Africa Cup of Nations once before in 1972 ©Getty Images

The 24-team draw for the 2021 Africa Cup of Nations in Cameroon is set to take place on Tuesday (August 17) at the Yaoundé Conference Centre in the country's capital city.

The qualified teams will be allocated into four pots of six each, based on their FIFA world ranking.

Based on this ranking, the top four teams will be allocated to Pot One along with the hosts, and title holders Algeria.

The remaining 18 teams will be allocated to the three remaining pots according to their ranking in descending order.

The Confederation of African Football (CAF) has published the match schedule for the tournament, which is scheduled to take place from January 9 to February 6 2022.

Riyad Mahrez, centre, helped Algeria to its second Africa Cup of Nations win in 2019 ©Getty Images
Riyad Mahrez, centre, helped Algeria to its second Africa Cup of Nations win in 2019 ©Getty Images

The opening match and final will be played at the newly built Olembe Stadium in Yaoundé which has a capacity of 60,000.

Douala, Bafoussam, Garoua and Limbe will also stage several matches.

The tournament was originally due to be played in June and July 2020 but in January 2020 the CAF announced it was delaying the event until January 2021 because of dangerous climatic conditions.

The CAF then moved the tournament for a second time to January 2022 following the effects of COVID-19 across Africa.

There have been 35 editions of the competition.

Egypt is the most successful country with seven titles while 2021 hosts Cameroon has five victories to its name.