PARIS — Senegal has been disqualifed from the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations after crowd trouble forced its qualifier with Ivory Coast to be abandoned, the Confederation of African Football (CAF) governing body said Tuesday. The decision was taken at a CAF disciplinary meeting in Cairo after violence flared in Dakar Saturday, with Ivory Coast players and fans pelted with stones, bottles and chairs, fires lit in the stands and firecrackers thrown. “As a result, CAF decided to officially confirm the result of the match as 2-0 in favor of Ivory Coast... and to consider Senegal the loser of the match and eliminated from the competition,” the CAF said in a statement on its website. Further sanctions may be taken against the east African side, it added. The violence erupted after Ivory Coast took a 2-0 lead for a 6-2 aggregate advantage in a qualifier for the finals in South Africa. The match was suspended for 40 minutes while police tried to restore order but the referee abandoned the game. Senegal football chiefs said Sunday that they would accept any punishment and apologized to Ivory Coast and its fans. The CAF said the decision was in accordance with article 16 paragraph 20 of its rules. It states: “If the referee is forced to stop the match before the end of the regular time because of invasion of the field or aggression against the visiting team, the host team shall be considered loser and shall be eliminated from the competition, without prejudice to the sanctions existing in the regulations.” Ivory Coast will once again be the team to beat when the competition finals begin early next year but it is not a tag the “Elephants” are comfortable wearing, after failing to justfy being favorite in the last four editions of the tournament. Didier Drogba, who scored against Senegal Saturday, and his co-stars finished runners-up to 2006 hosts Egypt, came fourth in Ghana two years later, made a 2010 quarterfinals exit and were runners-up again this year. Both final defeats came in penalty shoot-outs. South Africa could mark the last appearance in a major international competition for former Chelsea star Drogba, now plying his trade in Shanghai, as well as ageing stars Kolo Toure and Didier Zokora. Ivory Coast is among the top seeds for the tournament, which starts in Johannesburg on Jan. 19, with South Africa, Zambia and Ghana. 13 face life-ban for Zimbabwe match-fixing A Zimbabwean probe has recommended life bans for 13 national footballers and officials implicated in a 2009 match-fixing scam in Asia, according to a report released Tuesday. Although the probe team did not name the players and officials in the report, it further recommended a 10-year ban for seven people, a five-year ban for 37, two-year bans for 25 people and one to two-year bans for 10 players while eight players were exonerated. “Some officials and players will undoubtedly have their football futures ruined by these greedy, despicable, ruthless and unfeeling miscreants,” said retired high court judge and investigating team head Ahmed Ebrahim after the 13 were found guilty. “There is little doubt that these young players were carefully selected due to their inexperience, youth and immaturity.” Former Zimbabwe Football Association (ZIFA) chief executive Henrietta Rushwaya sent the national team to play unsanctioned friendlies in Thailand, Syria and Malaysia two years ago and a betting syndicate allegedly fixed the results. Rushwaya was later fired in 2010. Ebrahim said the exact details of how the Zimbabwe teams were involved in the match-fixing and betting syndicate allegedly organized by a Singapore-based man named Wilson Raj Perumal may never be known - but he said those behind the scam were driven by greed. — Agencies
