Ghana and Nigeria to co-host Nations' Cup

JOHANNESBURG, March 15 (Reuters) - Ghana and Nigeria were named co-hosts of next year's African Nations' Cup finals in a surprise move by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) announced on Monday.

The CAF decision ended any hopes of a reprieve for Zimbabwe, stripped of the right to hold the tournament last month. It was also a blow for Morocco, favourites to take over. The finals of the biennial competition, scheduled for January 23-February 13, have not been shared before.

The CAF executive committee meeting in Conakry said its decision was based on the fact that both Ghana and Nigeria had last hosted the competition almost 20 years ago, while Morocco staged it in 1988. The two west African countries will each hold 16 matches but the final will be played in Lagos. Ghana will host the opening game, as well as the CAF general assembly.

Zimbabwe's appeal for reinstatement was rejected. A government-led delegation met CAF officials earlier this month in a bid to win back the right to host the tournament but the CAF said "no new elements had been presented". Zimbabwe lost the finals because of the slow pace of construction of new stadiums as well as the lack of financial guarantees from the government, CAF decided. But Zimbabwe will be allowed to play in the qualifying competition, to be re-organised as Ghana and Nigeria now gain automatic entries to the 16-nation finals. Holders Egypt are also exempt from qualifying.

Zimbabwean F.A. president Leo Mugabe said: "I wasn't exactly shocked because I felt they had already taken their decision. "I have accepted the decision and am grateful that at least we can still take part in the qualifiers." "I'm not happy about it at all," said Zimbabwe's Dutch-born coach Clemens Westerhof, who won the Nations Cup with Nigeria in 1994.

"I'm very disappointed about this, particularly as the Nigerians promised they would back our bid to try and get the tournament back. "But I'm going to stay on as coach here because now I want to prove something to CAF and to show that they were wrong to treat Zimbabwe this way." Ghana and Nigeria will stage two of the four opening round groups and will share the quarter-finals and semifinals. Ghana will also host the third place play-off. September's draw for the tournament will be held in Nigeria. Ghana have been withdrawn from group one of the preliminary competition, where they have a 100 percent record at the halfway mark.

Their previous results against Cameroon, Mozambique and Eritrea will no longer count, CAF said. The same holds for Nigeria in group five, where they have already drawn qualifiers against Burkina Faso and Senegal and beaten Burundi.

Instead, the winners of the two groups will qualify automatically while the runners-up will go into a three-team play-off group with Zimbabwe, CAF said. The matches will be played on a home and away basis and the winner of the group qualifies. The top two finishers in groups two, three, four, six and seven also qualify.

Ghana hosted the event in 1963 and 1978 while Nigeria were in charge in 1980. On all three occasions, the home team won the African title.