Gambia’s Papa Bakary Gassama leads an A-list Referee group selected by CAF for the “historic” deployment of the Video Assistant Referee in the final of this year’s CAF inter-club tournaments.
The Top Referees with six Assistant Referees; but none from Nigeria, will embark on a preparatory course scheduled to hold between 24-29 this month.
VAR was approved for the CAF Champions League and CAF Confederation Cup finals last month by the continental body’s Executive Committee; after it ruled the testing during the CAF Super Cup in February got top ratings.
According to CAF General Secretary, Amr Fahmy, “This is a historic moment for African football. It clearly shows that CAF is determined and committed to the interclub competitions and will bring on board the latest and innovative technologies to make it better.
“We (CAF) are the first confederation to use VAR in the final of the Club competitions. We did it for the CAF Super Cup and we are delighted to go a step further with the Interclubs competitions.”
Full List of selected Referees and Assistant Referees:
The selected referees: Janny Sikazwe (Zambia), Ghead Grisha (Egypt), Mehdi Abid Charef (Algeria), Bamlak Tessema (Ethiopia), Victor Gomes (South Africa) and Papa Bakary Gassama (Gambia).
The Assistant Referees: Emiliano Jerson Dos Santos (Angola), Zakhele Siwela (South Africa), Jean Claude Birumushahu (Burundi), Anouar Hmila (Tunisia), Abdelhak Etchiali (Algeria) and Mahmoud Abo El Regal (Egypt).
