Afcon draw date set
The draw for the rescheduled 2021 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) in Cameroon will be held in Yaounde on August 17, the organisers said yesterday.
The draw was originally set for June 25 in the Cameroonian capital only to be delayed by coronavirus pandemic issues.
The 24-team premier African football tournament has twice been postponed because of Covid-19 and is now due to kick off on January 9 and conclude on February 6 2022.
Algeria will defend a trophy they won in Cairo two years ago by defeating Senegal 1-0 in the final through an early goal from Baghdad Bounedjah.
Cameroon are hosting the Cup of Nations for the first time since 1972, when only eight countries competed and Congo Brazzaville triumphed.
The other 22 qualifiers are Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Ivory Coast, Comoros, Egypt, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Tunisia, Sudan and Zimbabwe.
The ceremony will be attended by some high profile football stars who marked their era including Samuel Eto’o from Cameroon, Didier Drogba from Cote d’Ivoire and George Weah from Liberia.
After this ceremony, the 24 nations that qualified for the continental competition will be set on their groups ahead of the jamboree that will be played from January 9 to February 6.
It is worth recalling that the competition was initially scheduled to take place in June 202, but was postponed due to the deadly Coronavirus pandemic.—www.journalducameroun.com/en
