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| Ahmad Ahmad, middle, at CAF headquarters in Cairo |
Football
The African Nations Cup
will be moved to June and July and the size of the competition will grow from
16 to 24 finalists from the next edition in 2019.
These decisions were made
by the Confederation of African Football’s (CAF) executive committee on
Thursday.
Radical changes to
Africa’s leading competitions were formalised as CAF’s executive committee met
in Rabat .
The committee adopted
recommendations made at a wide-ranging symposium in Morocco earlier in the
week.
Other decisions taken at
the meeting included the awarding of the 2021 and 2023 Nations Cups to the
Ivory Coast and Guinea respectively.
Major changes have also
been introduced to Africa’s Champions League and Confederation Cup tournaments,
which will now run from August to May, like the UEFA Champions League, rather
than over the course of a calendar year.
This week’s symposium was
called by new CAF president Ahmad and was aimed at overhauling the game in
Africa.
CAF hold a congress in
Rabat on Friday to pass changes to the body’s statutes in order to bring it in
line with recent FIFA changes.
The expansion of the
Nations Cup puts pressure on 2019 hosts Cameroon, who have denied claims that
they are behind in their preparations.
“I would like to reassure
the national and international opinion that the government is fully committed
to fulfilling the CAF’s specifications and to date, no CAF mission has reported
any delay in preparations,” said Cameroon sports minister Ismael Bidoung.
African football chiefs
are due to inspect Cameroon’s tournament preparation in September, with Morocco
on stand-by as a potential back-up host if needed.
“Morocco will not hesitate
for a second to respond favourably to any invitation to host this Nations Cup,”
said their football association president Faouzi Lekjaa when asked.
Credit:(Reuters/NAN)
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