Yanga boycott Simba tie, set to face three-year ban

Mainland soccer champions Yanga yesterday boycotted Kagame Cup third place playoff match against their archrivals Simba.

The Council of East and Central Africa Football Associations (Cecafa) awarded a win to Simba after waiting for them for 45 minutes in the match was which supposed to be staged at the Main National Stadium in Dar es Salaam.

Simba were awarded 10,000 dollars (above 10m/-) donated by Rwanda President Paul Kagame.

Yanga Publicity Secretary-General Francis Lucas said they boycotted the game after Cecafa and Tanzania Football Federation (TFF) had failed to fulfill their promise.

He said the two bodies had agreed to give Yanga and Simba 50m/- each before the match because they were crowd-pulling teams in the regional tournament.

“We agreed that they give us 50m/- each before the match. They have not fulfilled the promise that is why we have not brought the team,“ Lucas said.

Cecafa Secretary-General Nicholas Musonye said Yanga sabotaged the 10-team championship. “What Yanga have done is not sportsmanship behaviour.

If they knew that they would not come they should have not come for the pre-match meeting. This is the first time this thing is happening in the history of the Cecafa,“ Musonye said, adding that they would take stern action against the team.

“TFF should also take action against Yanga because they have underrated the image of the nation,“ he added.

TFF First Vice President Crescentius Magori said Yanga did a bad thing which they would live to remember in the history of soccer.

“We had agreed to give them money as a way of promoting them and they both agreed. In fact, there was no condition on the payment because it is not in the Cecafa rules and regulations,“ Magori said.

A source with the Cecafa executive committee said that Yanga would face a three-year ban from competing in the Cecafa tourney.

• SOURCE: Guardian