Esperance ruling unfair, says Tunisian federation head

The Tunisian Football Federation (TFF) hit out on Friday at the rejection of Esperance's appeal following their riot-hit African Champions League final defeat. "As head of the Tunisian soccer governing body I deem the CAF (Confederation of African Football) decision unfair. I'm not happy with the ruling because it did not deal fairly with Esperance," said TTF chairman Khaled Sanchou.

"Frankly, I expected that the CAF would either order a replay of the second leg match or declare a defeat of Hearts of Oak."

Tunis side Esperance had protested after crowd trouble delayed the match for 18 minutes.

But CAF announced on Thursday that its inter-club committee had ruled that Esperance were defeated 3-1 by Ghana's Hearts of Oak in the second leg of the final in Accra on December 17. Hearts won 5-2 on aggregate.

A decision on an apparent attempt by Esperance goalkeeper Chokri El Ouaer to fake a serious injury to force the match to be abandoned was held over.

El Ouaer said he would complain to FIFA about South African referee Robin Williams and linesman Achmat Sallie, who alleged that they had seen the player inflict the cut on himself. "These accusations by the referee and the linesman are baseless and confirmed they were biaised against Esperance," El Ouaer was quoted as saying by Echourouk newspaper on Friday.