The Confederation of African Football (CAF) has selected four referees from the CECAFA region to officiate during TotalEnergies Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) Morocco 2022.
Twelve teams will tussle it out in the competition between July2-23rd in Rabat and Casablanca.
Lidya Tafesse Abebe (Ethiopia), who is also among the female referees selected to officiate at the FIFA World Cup 2022 in Qatar is among those selected for the WAFCON 2022. The others are; Rwanda’s Salima Mukansanga, Shamira Nabadda (Uganda) and Suavis Iratunga (Burundi).
The list comprises 16 referees, 16 assistant referees and eight Video Assistant Referees (VAR) from 24 countries.
CAF says the process of picking the match officials for the WAFCON 2022 started a few years ago with 226 women match officials that were evaluated over this period.
Uganda Crested Cranes and Burundi are the two teams from the CECAFA region that qualified to play in the WAFCON 2022.
It is recalled that Lidya is the first African female referee to officiate a senior men’s match at the continent level (CHAN). She was the only woman in the continent of 19 center referees who enforced the laws of the game in the 2020 African Nations Championship in Cameroon, Lidiya has also officiated the FIFA Women’s World Cup and the Africa Women Cup of Nations in the past.
Group A: Morocco, Burkina Faso, Uganda, Senegal
Group B: Cameroon, Zambia, Tunisia, Togo
Group C: Nigeria, South Africa, Burundi, Botswana
Ethiopian Lidya Tafesse selected for Women’s Afcon 2022
Shimeles Bekele Ethiopia’s most valuable player
The Ethiopian team includes a large number of distinguished players, and the marketing value of the Ethiopian team is $1.78m. Shimlis Beckley, the striker of El Gouna, is the most valuable player in the Ethiopian team. He played 54 international matches in various tournaments since 2010, including only two matches in the AFCON, 20 matches in the World Cup qualifiers, 24 matches in the qualifiers for the AFCON, and 8 friendly matches, with a total of 4,125 minutes.
The Ethiopian national team also includes a number of players, most notably Ethiopia Bunna prized goal hunter Abu Bakr Nasser, midfield defensive wall Kidus Giorgs’ Gatoch Panom, Fasil Ketema’s central defender Yared Bayeh and Sebeta Ketema’s shot stopper Fasil Gebremichel are of the few that impressed spectators who happened to watch the historic 2-0 victory over African giant Egypt.
Eight doctors and nurses face homicide charges after Maradona’s death
Eight doctors, nurses and a psychologist who cared for football legend Diego Maradona will be tried for homicide.
Maradona, who captained Argentina’s 1986 World Cup-winning team, died in November 2020 at the age of 60.
The star, who underwent surgery for a subdural hematoma a few weeks prior to his death, died due to cardiac arrest.
Prosecutors now claim his death was the result of “omissions” by his caregivers.
In the 236-page document seen by Reuters, the judge in charge of the case questioned “the behaviors – active or by omission – of each of the accused which led to and contributed to the realization of the harmful result”.
It said that eight people, including doctors, nurses and a psychologist who cared for Maradona at the time of his death, are accused of “simple homicide” – which means taking a life with intent.
The charge carries a sentence of between eight and 25 years in prison.
A medical team appointed to investigate Maradona’s death in 2021 said the star’s medical team acted in an “inappropriate, deficient and reckless manner”.
The defendants named in the ruling were Maradona’s neurosurgeon and personal doctor, Leopoldo Luque, psychiatrist Agustina Cosachov, psychologist Carlos Diaz, nurses Gisella Madrid and Ricardo Almiron, their boss Mariano Perroni, and doctors Pedro Di Spagna and Nancy Forlini.
They have all denied responsibility for Maradona’s death and the judge said that lawyers for some of them had requested the case be dismissed.
Gebreyesus to lead six member athlete refuge team at Oregon
Tokyo Olympian Tachlowini Gabriyesos will lead a six-member Athlete Refugee Team (ART) to next month’s World Athletics Championships Oregon22.
Gabriyesos, 24, made waves one year ago when he finished 16th in the Olympic marathon in Sapporo, beating some of the world’s best marathoners.
Gabriyesos fled conflict and bloodshed in Eritrea at age 12 and journeyed through Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt before crossing the Sinai desert on foot to Israel where he’s been living since 2010. He began running soon after and eventually found that he was best suited for athletics’ longest running event.
At the Hahula Galilee Marathon in Israel in March 2021, Gabriyesos clocked 2:10:55 to become the first refugee athlete to meet an Olympic qualifying standard. He later served as the co-flag bearer for the Olympic Refugee Team at Tokyo’s Opening Ceremonies. After his solid performance in Sapporo’s hot and muggy conditions, Gabriyesos improved to 2:10:09 at the Seville Marathon in February.
After its involvement with the inaugural Refugee Olympic Team that competed at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio, World Athletics established the Athlete Refugee Team in 2017 to provide refugees with high level training and competitive opportunities. It is the world’s only year-round team composed solely of refugee athletes. The team has been represented at almost every World Championship event since, in addition to a growing number of continental and regional events, most recently the European 10,000m Cup in May and the African Championships earlier this month.
