The Confederation of African Football president Patrice Motsepe has put rumours over the Africa Cup of Nations being postponed ‘to bed’ with a recent statement. Europe’s top clubs have already reportedly made their stance clear to FIFA, according to France 24.
The European Club Association told the governing body: “With regards to applicable protocols, as far as we are aware, CAF (the Confederation of African football) has not yet made available a suitable medical and operational protocol for the AFCON tournament, in the absence of which clubs will not be able to release players for the tournament.”
Should the tournament go ahead in the new year, Liverpool will be without Mohamed Salah, Sadio Mane and Naby Keita, who are set to miss Premier League matches against Brentford and Crystal Palace. Jurgen Klopp has previously voiced his concerns over the tournament, but says Liverpool ‘will have to deal with it’ in their absence.
Jurgen Klopp said: “The three boys helped us so much in the last few years and we knew that they were from Africa [when signing]. They have been so important in all these situations but now they are probably not here, so that’s the situation,” he said last week. You can’t always have the perfect solution. In this case, it’s absolutely far away from being perfect without these players. But we knew it, and now we have to deal with it.”
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