The Confederation of African Football (CAF) officially decided that the 2018/2019 CAF Champions League game will be a rematch after the VAR controversy.
Rabat – The Confederation of African Football (CAF) officially decided Wednesday that Morocco’s Wydad Athletic Club (WAC) and Tunisia’s Esperance Tunis (EST) will play a rematch for the controversial Friday (May 31) night game.
The match will be replayed after the African Cup of Nations (CAN) on a field outside Tunisia, said adviser to CAF president, Hédi Hamel, adding that the EST should return the Trophy and the medals awarded to them.
During last Friday’s match in Tunis, Wydad of Casablanca, were 2-1 behind on aggregate when they leveled the score just before the hour mark. But Gambian referee Bakary Gassama disallowed Walid Karti’s header for an alleged infringement.
WAC players protested to the Gambian referee, demanding VAR be used. To their utter dismay, the referee kept refusing to check the video technology only to be told more than 20 minutes later that the VAR was not functioning.
CAF president Ahmad Ahmad spent almost 30 minutes in discussions with officials in a bid to get the game restarted.
Amid embarrassing scenes in Tunis and after 90 minutes of interruption and total chaos on the pitch, the referee declared home side Esperance winners of the African Champions League.
After a football scandal that Wydad of Casablanca chairman, Said Naciri deemed a “total shame for African football,” CAF convened an emergency meeting in Paris to examine the unprecedented controversies that surrounded the second leg of the Champions’ League final.
Less than 24 hours after last Friday’s controversial match, CAF President said that Wydad of Casablanca’s goal was legitimate. “If somebody did not see WAC’s goal as legitimate, he then should change his hobby and to stop watching football,” Ahmad Ahmad said in a statement to Moroccan sports news outlet Almountakhab.
The emergency meeting of the CAF Executive Committee, which took place with the participation of a Moroccan delegation made up of officials of the Royal Moroccan Football Federation (FRMF) and Wydad of Casablanca, opened on Tuesday morning before being postponed for the first time for the evening and then for Wednesday afternoon.
