By Batsirai Sango.
Africa’s premiere club football competition the CAF Champions league roared back to life with the football extravaganza’s group phase decided, and football fanatics on the continent can surely fasten their seatbelts and ready themselves for one exciting ride of football.
The last couple of seasons has witnessed continental club football growing in leaps and bounds, with new protagonists coming on to the scene a sheer reflection of the ever-increasing interest football clubs across the continent are taking in the motherland’s flagship club football tournament.
With a total of 58 teams taking part in the preliminary the sheer stats clearly show how from Cape to Cairo, Nairobi to Accra football is really active and taking shape not only in entertaining but also in bringing about development and cohesion in communities. With more than 50 affiliate members the continental football mother body has and having 58 football clubs taking part in the preliminary round of the continent’s biggest club football competition clearly the strides that have been made in taking football to every part of the motherland.
The Motsepe CAF presidency has surely brought a breath of fresh air with the good governance they have fostered in running the affairs of the most popular sport on the continent.
The football mad continent can thus expect one of the most enthralling champions league seasons as only juggernauts have made it to the group stage with a balanced representation of the vast motherland. They can no David versus Goliath affair in this season’s competition and will surely see African football’s stock rising. Gone are the days, seasons where you would have one part of the continent represented more than the other a clear testament of the growth of the game.
The table below of the 16 teams that have made it through to the group stage of the champions league will surprise many, as there is no Etoile Du Sahel of Tunisia, Zamalek of Egypt, Wydad Casablanca of Morrocco, Asec Mimosa of Cote d’Ivoire, Enyimba of Nigeria, Petro Luanda of Angola who were eliminated by Democratic Republic of Congo’s AS Maniema who made history qualifying for the group phase in their inaugural participation. Lubumbashi giants TP Mazembe complete the Congolese duet.GD Sagrada Esperanca (Angola) will be in place of Luanda giants Petro Luanda who agonizingly missed out on this season’s group phase.
- Al Ahly SC (Egypt)
- Al Hilal SC (Sudan)
- AS FAR (Morocco)
- AS Maniema Union (DR Congo)
- CR Belouizdad (Algeria)
- Djoliba AC De Bamako (Mali)
- GD Sagrada Esperanca (Angola)
- Espérance Sportive de Tunis (Tunisia)
- Mamelodi Sundowns (South Africa)
- MC Alger (Algeria)
- Pyramids FC (Egypt)
- Orlando Pirates (South Africa)
- Raja Casablanca (Morocco)
- Stade d’Abidjan (Cote d’Ivoire)
- TP Mazembe (DR Congo)
- Young Africans SC (Tanzania)
The teams that make up the 16 clearly show how new faces are slowly making and securing their mark on African football, Young Africans of Tanzania are slowly making it a religion to be among the big boys of African football having been knocked out in the last 8 in last season’s champions league by Tshwane giants Mamelodi Sundowns, you also have Soweto giants Orlando Pirates making return after half a decade absence from the group phase.
The sheer appeal these clubs have from where they hail from promises to give this season’s competition the kind of fanaticism that will not only make the competition exciting but also attract more commercial appeal not to broadcasters but also to new sponsors of the game.
As the continent’s football gladiators prepare to take to the football coliseum, we can hold our breath in anticipation of a spectacle like we have never seen before.
