Confederation of African Football, the continent’s football governing body has postponed the Qatar 2022 World Cup qualifiers as a result of the new surge in COVID-19 cases.
CAF, on Thursday made the announcement in a statement released by its Communications team in a reassessment of protocols.
The date of the qualifiers has been shifted to the September, October and November windows given to national teams by FIFA.
The statement said “… the CAF Emergency Committee, in consultation with FIFA, decided to postpone the CAF qualifiers for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 that were due to be played in June 2021 after taking into consideration the current challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, and the need to ensure the optimal playing conditions for all participating teams.”
CAF said the qualifiers will now take place in the existing windows of September, October and November 2021, and March 2022.
The governing body is reassessing its protocols and processes to enhance the implementation of COVID-related protocols, including specifically focusing on pre-match testing which had been the source of some challenges in previous windows.
