By David Gold
October 9 – South Africa are appealing to the Confederation of African Football (CAF) over their elimination from the 2012 African Nations Cup after they mistakenly played for a draw in their final qualifying game with Sierra Leone.
The country’s Football Association (SAFA) have decided to lodge the protest with CAF as they believed goal difference to be the crucial factor in deciding who qualified if two teams were level on points at the end of qualifiers.
South Africa’s 0-0 draw yesterday meant that they were on six points along with their opponents and Niger.
Though they had the better goal difference, head-to-head records take precedence in qualifiers and so it was Niger who made it to Equatorial Guinea and Gabon next year, despite a 3-0 defeat away to Egypt, the champions of the last three tournaments who had already been knocked out.
The SAFA said that they want to “signal that we intend to challenge the interpretation and application of the rules”.
Pitso Mosimane (pictured), the South Africa coach, was livid after the game after he carefully ground out a draw thinking it was enough to qualify, with the squad even celebrating afterwards before discovering their fate.
“Do you think I would have left [striker Lehlohonolo] Majoro on the bench and put on a midfielder if I knew that we needed a goal?” he said.
“It doesn’t make sense.”
Rule 14.1 of the CAF 2012 Nations Cup is the regulation in dispute, which seems to indicate that results between the teams concerned separates them if they finish level on points ahead of goal difference.
CAF and SAFA have not had a great relationship over the years, with the former’s President Issa Hayatou having encouraged African nations to vote for Morocco’s bid to host the 2010 World Cup in 2004 ahead of South Africa.
Last month the two again had a minor disagreement over the swapping of the hosting of the 2013 and 2017 African Nations Cups with Libya.
Libya were to host the 2013 event and South Africa the 2017 version, but the two swapped, and CAF were angered when SAFA prematurely announced the deal before their Executive Committee had the opportunity to ratify the proposal.
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