MRI: CAF Disqualifies Two Teams from CECAFA U-17 AFCON Qualifiers

The Confederation of African Football (CAF) has disqualified the national U-17 teams of Djibouti and Sudan from the qualifiers of the U-17 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) for the CECAFA Zone.

The two teams were sanctioned after some of their players failed the mandatory Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) tests.

All the eight teams that arrived in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia for the qualifiers had to undergo MRI tests.

Auka Gecheo, the CECAFA Executive Director confirmed that the CAF Youth Organizing Committee decided to disqualify the two teams by article 27.4 of the U-17 Africa Cup of Nations regulations.

The article stipulates that: “ If after performing the age eligibility test (MRI) for a participating team and one (1) player was found non-eligible, the participating team will be disqualified.”

The U-17 AFCON is a bi-annual competition organized by CAF which has been held since 1995. Nigeria is one of the joint successful teams in the tournament with 2 titles along with 4 other countries.