DECEMBER 2000 SPORT HEADLINES

Tuesday, January 9, 2001 - Web posted at 11:52:44 AM GMT

Stamina-sapping year ahead for African footballers

JOHANNESBURG - Just looking at the African fixture list for this year is enough to make any footballer breathless.

There are eight rounds of World Cup qualifiers and four rounds of African Nations Cup qualifiers before the end of Jauly with five places in Japan and South Korea and 14 places in Mali at stake.

Cameroon, whose presence at the Nations Cup is guaranteed as holders, go to the Far East at the end of May for the Confederations Cup, which should prove an illuminating experience for the best African national team.

And as if that was not enough to drain the stamina of even the fittest, the African Champions League has been expanded with a two-leg semi-final round the price clubs must pay for chasing a record one-million-dollar first prize.

Hearts of Oak of Ghana and Zamalek of Egypt, holders of the Champions League and Cup Winners Cup respectively, have the mixed blessing of places at the mid-year world club championship in Spain.

While the prizes run into millions of dollars, the 12-club competition only adds to the burden on tired limbs and minds of semi-professionals, and neither side can realistically hope to trouble the giants of Europe and South America.

A calendar that seems to expand every year also includes the lucrative Castle Cup Southern Africa championship, which has benefited weaker teams in the region enormously with Lesotho reaching the final last year.

Dates have yet to be announced for the West African Football Union club championship, which is hardly surprising given that the 2000 tournament has not been concluded.

The semi-finals, featuring two clubs from Nigeria and one from Sierra Leone and Togo, and scheduled for last month in Lome, had to be called off due to an embarrassing lack of funds.

There are finals in both age-limit championships with the idyllic Indian Ocean island of Seychelles hosting the junior event in February and Ethiopia the youth tournament one month later.

It all begins this weekend with round three of the Nations Cup qualifiers and continues virtually non-stop until December 23 when the second leg of the Champions League is staged.

Amid all the action, the Cairo-based African Football Confederation (CAF) has got to eradicate the scourge of crowd violence, which did huge damage to the image of the sport last year.

The stench of teargas enveloped grounds from Algiers to Johannesburg with trouble in Zimbabwe during a World Cup qualifier provoking a heavy-handed police reaction that led to 13 deaths during a stampede to the exits.

Play was halted for 20 minutes at the Champions League final in Ghana and persistent stone throwing forced the women's championship final in South Africa to be abandoned.

Lobbing teargas canisters into troublesome crowds is hardly the solution.

Instigators need to be swiftly identified and removed before the seeds of mayhem are sown.

That old African failing of government interference also needs to be addressed.

Tanzania were banished from world governing body FIFA last year after booting out of office two senior officials accused of fraud.come mid-year in Argentina, Africa will an attentive watcher when FIFA holds an extraordinary congress to discuss, among other issues, rotation of the World Cup finals.

Still hurt by the controversial manner in which Germany pipped South Africa for the right to host the 2006 tournament, Africa believes it should be first on the rotation treadmill and be awarded the 2010 World Cup.

Cameroon, Nigeria, Morocco, Tunisia and South Africa, the five African qualifiers for the 1998 World Cup, have been seeded to reach the international showpiece again.

After 3-0 victories over Libya and Angola, Cameroon are well on their way in Group A, but a 2-1 loss in Liberia has upset Nigeria in Group B, and there is still talented if unpredictable Ghana to come.

Morocco have not been overly impressive either, drawing in Namibia and squeezing past Algeria at home.

With four-time African champions Egypt also involved, Group C could well go to the wire.

Holding Ivory Coast 2-2 in Abidjan was a significant result for Tunisia in Group D while Titi Camara-inspired Guinea appear likely to pose the biggest threat to South Africa in Group E.

While only one team out of five qualifies from each World Cup group, the Nations Cup path is much smoother with half the 28 contenders earning tickets to the partly-desert West African state of Mali.

Madagascar could mock the form book in Group 1 after winning in Zambia while 2000 quarter-finalists Senegal have begun poorly with a home draw against Togo followed by a loss in Guinea.

The finals line-up may read: Nigeria, Madagascar, South Africa, Liberia, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria, Angola, Guinea, Togo, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Egypt and Ivory Coast plus hosts Mali and holders Cameroon.

No club has successfully defended the Champions League since TP Englebert of DR Congo 33 years ago and Hearts of Oak are unlikely to alter the trend, especially if strikers Ishmael Addo and Emmanuel Kuffour head for Europe.

They should reach the mini-league phase, however, with ASEC of Ivory Coast, Julius Berger of Nigeria, Al-Ahly of Egypt, Esperance of Tunisia, Sundowns of South Africa, Chabab Belouizdad of Algeria and Raja Casablanca of Morocco.

Zamalek and Ismailia of Egypt are the teams to beat in the Cup Winners Cup while the biggest threats to CAF Cup holders JS Kabylie of Algeria should come from Etoile Sahel of Tunisia and Africa Sports of Ivory Coast.

- Nampa-Sapa-AFP