Cameroon to play AFCON after CAS dismisses Comoros case

Cameroon will play at the Africa Cup of Nations after the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) dismissed the appeals from the Comoros Football Federation (FFC) over their participation.

The FFC argued Cameroon should be excluded from the 2019 tournament after they were stripped of hosting rights.

Egypt were made hosts of the finals in January after the Confederation of African Football (CAF) deemed Cameroon not fit to host an expanded 24-team format after delays in their preparations.

However, CAS said the FFC’s appeals are inadmissible as it has no “concrete sporting interest” in excluding Cameroon as doing so “would have no impact on the ranking of the FFC in its qualifying group for the 2019 [tournament] and that it was therefore mathematically impossible for it to qualify for this competition”.

CAS “also concluded that the FFC had no sufficient legal interest” in requesting Cameroon’s football federation (FECAFOOT) be suspended.

Defending champions Cameroon finished second in Group B of AFCON qualifying to book their place in the tournament, where they are to scheduled to meet Guinea-Bissau, Ghana and Benin in the pool stages.