July 14 – Kicked from pillar to post in recent months over staging major events, sometimes due to its own inadequacies, Cameroon has pulled out of hosting a planned mini-tournament to decide the 2020 African Champions League winners.
The Confederation of African Football (CAF) have been waiting to hear whether Cameroon can stage the semi-finals and final but the country has withdrawn because of Covid-19.
Cameroon had been scheduled to host the showpiece final in Doualla in May, only for the competition to be disrupted at the semi-final stage and replaced with a knockout event of single-leg games.
But Cameroon FA boss Seidou Mbombo Njoya said in a statement that the government had blocked the revamped finale.
“I told the CAF that the government has not agreed to host the semi-finals and the final of this prestigious African competition due to COVID-19 and the uncertainties about the short-term evolution of this pandemic,” he said.
CAF have chosen no replacement as yet but Tunisia and Egypt are rumoured to be in the frame. Cairo giants Al Ahly and Zamalek and Morocco’s Wydad and Raja Casablanca contest the semi-finals.
Cameroon are already staging the next African Nations Cup which was recently postponed until January 2022 because of a backlog of matches caused by the coronavirus. It was initially scheduled to be the venue for the 2019 event before CAF stripped the country of hosting rights because of delays in preparations and security concerns, and handed it 2021 instead.
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