Menzi Magubane
The postponement of the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) qualifiers will be welcomed by all national teams involved in this year’s Fifa World Cup.
The qualifiers were scheduled to resume in September but the Confederation of African Football (CAF) has moved the games to March next year.
CAF took that decision to give African teams that will be taking part in the 2022 Fifa World Cup more time to prepare for the showpiece. The World Cup is scheduled for November and December in Qatar.
“CAF Executive Committee has approved a revised Total Energies Africa Cup of Nations 2023 qualification in Côte d’Ivoire,” said a CAF statement.
“This was necessitated by the Executive Committee’s commitment to make room for African nations that have qualified for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar to prepare adequately.”
Ghana, Senegal, Morocco, Tunisia, Cameroon and Ivory Coast are the national teams who will benefit from this postponement. They are the five countries that will be representing Africa at the World Cup.
The postponement will also be beneficial for Bafana Bafana even though they won’t be a part of the Qatar competition.
Bafana had back-to-back dates with Liberia in September.
With the DStv Premiership new season set to begin on Friday, Bafana coach Hugo Broos will now have a chance to take a closer look at the players he will be using in March.
Both Bafana and Liberia lost their opening qualification matches to Morocco.
Bafana are likely to qualify for next year’s Afcon if they can manage to beat Liberia in those two matches and score a point against Morocco will guarantee them the place in Ivory Coast.
Image source: @Goal
