director Eric Abidal and
chief executive Oscar Grau over
the weekend, before reportedly
rejecting their offer and remaining
in charge of Qatari side Al Sadd.
TURKEY: Juventus defender
Merih Demiral will undergo surgery
after suffering an anterior cruciate
ligament injury against Roma in
Serie A at the weekend. With the
recovery time for such an injury
between four and six months, the
21-year-old looks likely to miss the
summer’s Euro finals.
Tuesday January 14
AUSTRALIA: Macarthur FC
announce international midfielder
Tommy Oar will be their first-
ever signing and he will join the
A-League’s newest club from
Central Coast Mariners for the
2020-21 campaign.
USA: DC United pay a club record
fee of $5m to sign Peru midfielder
Edison Flores from Mexican side
Monarcas Morelia.Wednesday January 15
AFRICA CUP OF NATIONS: The
2021 finals in Cameroon will now
take place between January 9 and
February 6 after the tournament
was moved from June and July due
to weather conditions at that time
of year in the country.
AUSTRALIA: Melbourne Victory
sack coach Marco Kurz after just
13 A-League matches following
the side’s worst-ever start to a
league campaign, with two wins
and nine points from the first 10
games. Assistant coach Carlos
Salvachua is put in charge for
the rest of the season.
JAPAN: Kazuyoshi Miura, who
turns 53 in February, agrees a deal
to play for another season in the
top-flight J1 League. “I was able to
renew my contract with Yokohama
FC in the 2020 season,” he says.
“I’ll do my best to contribute.”WORLD SERVICE
in each of the last four tournaments.
Mazembe, who last won the Champions League in
2015, were watched by their new Serbian technical
director Dragan Cvetkovic as they came from behind
to beat Angola’s Primeiro Agosto 2-1 and extend
their four-year unbeaten home record to 48 games.
Winners in 2016, Sundowns also won 2-1 on home
soil, beating USM Alger, but they still have to entertain
Wydad in a game that is likely to decide who finishes
top and gets a more favourable pairing when the last-
eight draw is made in Cairo on February 9.
Since 2016, North African clubs have stood on
the winners’ podium, with Wydad winning in 2017
and Tunisia’s Esperance triumphing for the last two
editions. In total, clubs from the Arabic-speaking
north have won 31 of 55 past
Champions Cup/Champions
League titles.
Esperance and Al Ahly of
Egypt both reached a milestone
in mid-January, each playing
their 100th game in the group
phase of the Champions League
since it was first introduced to
Africa in 1997.
Esperance are well set in
Group D after winning away at
Raja of Casablanca in their first
group game in December and
then against AS Vita Club of
DR Congo in January. However,
qualification has not yet been
secured and they still need a
point from their last two games.
Al Ahly have won more titles
than any other club in African
Champions League history but
getting through Group B is
proving no easy matter.
After four rounds they trailed
Etoile Sahel of Tunisia, who had
nine points, and they were just
one ahead of Sudan’s Al Hilal,
who had six. Ahly must still go to
Khartoum for a likely showdown
in their final group game after
dropping points away at FC
Platinum, who held them 1-1 in Bulawayo where
Marwan Mohsen’s goal rescued a share of the spoils.
The dates for the new-look Finals of both the
Champions League and African Confederation Cup
will be played at the end of May.
The Confederation of African Football have
chosen to introduce a single Final at a neutral
venue for the first time for both competitions and
have fixed the Confederation Cup Final for Sunday
May 24 and the Champions League Final on the
following Friday, May 29.
The venues are yet to be settled as CAF takes
a major risk in hoping there will be enough neutral
interest to watch the games.
The announcement of the dates follows a massive
overhaul to the fixture list for the rest of this season’s
club competitions.
The decision to host the African Nations
Championship (CHAN) in Cameroon in Aprilmeans the group phase of both the Champions
League and Confederation Cup will now be squashed
into just two months.
No club competition matches can be played at
the same time as the CHAN 2020 tournament
from April 4 to 25, so the programme for the club
competitions has had to change.
The final three matchdays, set for February and
March, have now been crammed into January and
the first two days of February.
The quarter-finals draw is being brought forward a
full month and the knockout phase now commences
at the end of February rather than in April as had
been previously scheduled.
By the time the CHAN 2020 tournament starts,
the two club competitions will be down to their last
four competitors.
The two legs of the semi-finals now take place
over the first two weekends of May.Qualified...
Andile Jali
of Mamelodi
Sundowns
(in yellow)Lead...Etoile Sahel (in red) top
Group B after four gamesThe Final venues are yet
to be settled as CAF takes
a major risk in hoping
there will be enough neutral
interest to watch the gamesHolders...Algeria’s Riyad Mahrez with
the Africa Cup of Nations trophy