The Confederation of African Football (Caf) has confirmed the new date for the African Football League (AFL) second leg final between Mamelodi Sundowns and Moroccan giants Wydad Athletic Club to avoid a clash with the Soweto derby.
The second leg of the new continental competition was initially scheduled to take place in Pretoria on Saturday, November 11, the day that Kaizer Chiefs will host Orlando Pirates at FNB Stadium in Soweto (3.30pm).
However, sanity has prevailed with the decider of the lucrative AFL being moved to Sunday, November 12 at Loftus Stadium in Pretoria (3pm).
“The second leg will be played in Pretoria (Tshwane) at Loftus Versfeld Stadium on Sunday, November 12 at 15H00 local time (13H00 GMT and 15H00 Cairo time) where the Inaugural African Football League (“AFL”) Champions will be crowned,” Caf said in a statement.
This put to bed fears of the two big clashes drowning each other as it would have forced supporters to choose which of the fixtures to attend on the day.
Though Chiefs and Pirates haven’t won the DStv Premiership title in a while and don’t look to be in contention in the current campaign, the Soweto derby remains the biggest fixture in the country and larger part of Africa.
The first leg of the AFL final will take place in Morocco on Sunday, where Sundowns will be hoping to put themselves in an advantageous position before they come home next weekend.
The winner of the inaugural competition will collect a whopping R76m for playing just six games while the runners-up will take home R57m.
The semi-finalists took home R32m while quarterfinals pocketed R19m.
Meanwhile, Wydad will play Sundowns on Sunday (8pm, SA time) under a dark cloud after the death of defender Oussama Falouh on Thursday.
Falouh, 24, was seriously injured in a car accident last month and remained in a coma until his death, according to media reports.
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