South Africa will have four teams in the 2017 edition of the African Champions League following the Confederation of African Football’s recent reforms.
The Premier Soccer League could only enter two teams in the competition before, but following Caf Symposium and Caf Congress which took place in Rabat, Morocco, the PSL will now have four more representatives in the competition.
This means PSL champions Bidvest Wits, Mamelodi Sundowns, Cape Town City as well as Kaizer Chiefs will all get the chance to participate in next seasons edition of the competition.
The African tournaments calendar date has also changed, rather than having the competition during the month of January/February, the competition will now take place during June and July.
Safa president Danny Jordaan believes that South African football will reap the benefits of the recent reforms alongside Egypt who will also have four representatives in the tournament.
“This is good for the game. Africa has simply synchronized its calendar with the rest of the world and this will benefit Africa a great deal,” Dr Jordaan.
“We are likely to witness more competitive tournaments with more viewership and definitely more revenue.”
The tournament will commence from August to May and Jordaan believes that the four teams representing SA will have to step up their game and show the quality the country has to offer.
“As you can see for both Egypt and South Africa they (Caf) have allocated four places in the Champions League and that is on the basis that these teams are strong‚ thriving and truly professional teams,” he added.
“Some of our teams (in SA) can compete with the best clubs anywhere in the world, but it is not so for every country in the world.
“This is something we have to greatly support and give more attention to‚ which is part of the reason why we come here (to SA) in September to address this matter.
“Even professional football in this country has come a long way and it is now that it has taken a step up. It is not so on the rest of the continent.”
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– This story originally appeared on SportsClub.co.za