adminEddie Chikamhi Senior Sports Reporter
THE Mighty Warriors may be forced to abandon a training camp that was supposed to begin in Harare tomorrow after the Confederation of African Football announced the postponement of the start of the 2022 CAF Women’s Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers.
Zimbabwe were scheduled to host Eswatini in a first round, first leg match, at the National Sports Stadium on June 7 before travelling for the return leg a week later.
But there were always doubts if the matches could go ahead after CAF had postponed the men’s 2022 World Cup qualifiers that had been scheduled to kick-off the same week.
The CAF organising committee for women’s football said the decision was reached because of poor state of stadia in some countries and restrictions related to the Covid-19 pandemic.
“CAF’s Organising Committee of Women Football decided to postpone the qualifiers of the women Africa Cup of Nations, Morocco 2022 In line with the postponement of the Men World Cup Qualifiers,” CAF said in a circular to member associations this week.
“The reasons of the postponements were based on the actual conditions of certain stadiums in Africa and the restrictions related to Covid19.
“The 1st round will now take place in the FIFA window of 18 to 26 October, 2021 and the second round will take place in the FIFA window of 14 to 23 February, 2022.”
The finals of the tournament, which have been set for Morocco, also doubles as the African qualifiers for the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup. The top four teams will qualify for the global showpiece in Australia and New Zealand, and two more teams will advance to the inter-confederation play-offs.
Mighty Warriors coach Sithethelewe “Kwinji 15” Sibanda had already called up a 25-member squad that was expected to go into camp on Thursday to prepare for their first-round match against Eswatini.
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