African Cup of Nations Could Move, But Not By Much

January 15th, 2008 | by: Daryl | Comments Off

Seems all that complaining from Premier League managers about the African Cup of Nations interrupting their season is going to pay off, as the Confederation of African Football is considering moving the tournament. By one week. Maybe.

There’s a discussion taking place about starting the 2010 African Cup of Nations a little earlier in January, but the CAF is adamant that neither the general timing nor the frequency of the tournament is going to change. “It is not even a matter for discussion,” CAF general secretary Mustapha Fahmy (pictured) told Reuters. “The tournament will stay as is it is.” That means no summer African Cup of Nations and no switch from a biennial to quadrennial schedule.

But the slight shift of one week does point towards a possible, eventual compromise in this increasingly familiar dispute. What if all the European leagues (especially the Premier League) took a winter break and the Cup of Nations was scheduled to coincide? I’m sure there’s a serious flaw in that plan that I’m unaware of, but at least it would show club and country organizations working together to solve a problem, rather than clubs demanding that an entire continental organization reorganizes to suit them.