The second golden age arrived with the new century. Pierre Lechantre’s squad took the 2000 title against co-hosts Nigeria in a shoot-out after a 2–2 final, with a young Samuel Eto’o the team’s joint top scorer on four goals. Winfried Schäfer’s Lions then defended it in Mali in 2002 without conceding a single goal in six matches, beating Senegal on penalties in the final. Eto’o would keep scoring across six tournaments until no one in the competition’s history had scored more.
The third came in Gabon in 2017. Hugo Broos’s side went a goal down to Egypt in the final, levelled through Nicolas Nkoulou and won it two minutes from time through Vincent Aboubakar — Cameroon’s fifth title, and still the second-highest total after Egypt’s seven. Five years later Aboubakar captained the hosts at Cameroon 2021, scored eight goals and led a three-goal comeback against Burkina Faso to secure third place in Yaoundé.
Under David Pagou, appointed three weeks before the tournament, Cameroon reached the quarter-finals at Morocco 2025 before losing to the hosts. The road to East Africa now runs through Group G — Comoros, Namibia and Congo — with two places available and a squad in the middle of a generational change.