The head of Senegal’s soccer governing body vowed on Thursday to \u200cmount a \u201ccrusade\u201d against a decision by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) to strip the country\u2019s African Cup of Nations title, as its legal team warned the case could reshape the world of football and undermine \u200bthe principle that refereeing decisions are final.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis decision cannot even be considered a true \u200bsporting justice ruling \u2014 it is so crude, so absurd, so irrational,\u201d lawyer \u2060Juan de Dios Crespo Perez, representing Senegal’s ruling body, told a press conference.<\/p>\n
“It openly violates \u200bthe Laws of the Game and the principle that refereeing decisions are final. (If CAS would rule \u200bagainst Senegal), the winners of the next World Cup could be decided in law firms rather than on the pitch.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the face of this administrative robbery, the FSF refuses fatality. We will fight a moral and \u200blegal crusade,\u201d Abdoulaye Fall, president of the Senegalese Football Federation (FSF), said.<\/p>\n
The FSF lodged an appeal \u200bat the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) on Wednesday against the decision to overturn the result.<\/p>\n
Senegal were ruled \u200cto \u2060have forfeited the final in Rabat on January 18 after walking off the pitch in protest at a potentially decisive penalty awarded to Morocco.They returned and scored a goal in extra time to win the game 1-0.<\/p>\n
Senegal, who have qualified for this year’s World Cup, face Peru \u200bin a friendly in \u200bParis on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Serge \u2060Vittoz, part of a six-lawyer legal team in Paris, said they were asking CAS to speed up the process.<\/p>\n
“Such a procedure usually last nine \u200bto 12 months but we want it to go faster. However, \u200ball parties \u2060must agree to it,” Vittoz said.<\/p>\n
Asked whether the trophy would be presented to their fans at the Stade de France on Saturday, Fall said: “I’ll see you at the Stade de France on March \u206028.”<\/p>\n
Vittoz \u200bargued that the decision of CAF’s appeal board to \u200boverturn the result of the final had not been explained.<\/p>\n
“To be valid, a decision must be explained. It has not \u200bbeen, so Senegal are still African champions,” Vittoz said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The head of Senegal’s soccer governing body vowed on Thursday to \u200cmount a \u201ccrusade\u201d against a decision by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) to strip the country\u2019s African Cup of Nations title, as its legal team warned the case could reshape the world of football and undermine \u200bthe principle that refereeing decisions are final. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20214,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":10,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","source_name":"Reuters","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[2362,326,27],"tags":[2690,4973,4972,283],"class_list":["post-20280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-sport","category-west-africa","tag-confederation-of-african-football-caf","tag-court-of-arbitration-for-sport-cas","tag-juan-de-dios-crespo-perez","tag-senegal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20280"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20280\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20281,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20280\/revisions\/20281"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}