Football Kenya Federation (FKF) has written to Confederation of African Football (CAF) asking the body to reschedule their 2021 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier against Comoros over Coronavirus.
The Harambee Stars are supposed to host Les Coelacantes at the Kasarani Stadium on 25 March in their third Group G match but are now asking for the match to be rescheduled after the government imposed a month-long ban on all international meetings in a measure to avert Coronavirus spread.
FKF president Nick Mwendwa has confirmed that they have asked CAF to move the match to a later date because the government has issued a 30-day ban on all conferences that have over 15 foreigners scheduled to come to the country.
“We have written to CAF seeking to have the upcoming qualifier against Comoros postponed to a later date owing to the coronavirus,” FKF president, Nick Mwendwa, was quoted by Goal.Com.
[perfectpullquote align=”full” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””] “We are acting as per the directive from the government which banned all meetings involving over 15 people and we have explained to CAF the directive from the government. [/perfectpullquote]
“We don’t want to take a risk now that most of the players in the Comoros squad play in France and it is one of the countries which has been affected hard by the virus. We are over 45 million people and it will be wrong if the first case of coronavirus is detected in Kenya because of football.
“We are hoping CAF will listen to our request and call off the match but if they don’t, then we will wait for the government to give the way forward.”
Recently, CAF stated that they are closely monitoring the Coronavirus situation by forming a medical committee as part of its measures to protect the health of players and all actors of the game.
The African football mother body said that if the situation requires and in agreement with the countries concerned, matches behind closed doors, postponements or even cancellations are envisaged.
The Kenyan government has increased its efforts in containing the Coronavirus and last week, the East African nation cancelled Kenya Open Golf tournament, which is part of European Tour.
The Kenya Open was scheduled to take place March 12-15 but was stopped following advice from the government to postpone all meetings and conferences in the country that are of an international nature.
