CAF EXTENDED SUBMISSION

MBABANE – In prematurely announcing Young Buffaloes and Royal Leopard as the country’s representatives in the CAF Inter-club competitions, the Premier League of Eswatini (PLE) jumped the gun.

The Times Sports Desk can reveal that the Confederation of African Football (CAF) in its website, states categorically clear that the registration of players for the TotalEnergies CAF inter-club competitions has been extended to August 15, 2021. It posted the communiqué on its website on Tuesday at the same time the PLE announced that Young Buffaloes will represent the country in the CAF Champions League and Royal Leopard will contest in the Confederation Cup inspite of the league having as much as nine games remaining.

Pronouncement

During the pronouncement, the PLE stated that this was based on the end of the first round log standings where the army side were number one with the police outfit on the second spot. However, PLE chairman, Mark Carmichael clarified yesterday that the decision was taken based on the correspondence from the Eswatini Football Association (EFA) that the deadline for submission was June 30 and they are now willing to withdraw the submission if there is a leeway to get an extension on the deadline submission. “The honest truth is that this is what was presented to us as demands of the CAF Inter-club competition that participants have to be submitted before June 30, 2021 and we discussed it as an Executive Committee and used the first round log standings as a determining factor. Now that it has been brought to our attention that the EFA is still awaiting CAF’s response on the matter, we will withdraw the names of the teams and wait for the league to finish,” Carmichael said.

discussions

EFA Communications and Marketing Officer Muzi Radebe reiterated his organisation’s stance that they were in discussions with CAF on the submission deadline extension. “We did write to CAF to ask for the extension because we could tell the league won’t meet the June 30 deadline.

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