Nigeria Football Federation, NFF, and Libya Football Federation, LFF, are trading blames after botched Matchday four 2025 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier between Nigeria and Libya as Confederation of Africa Football, (CAF) has intervened by assuring that appropriate actions will be taken against any of the two federations who violated their statues and rules which prevented the match the match to hold, Sports247 reports.
The Nigeria delegation of players and officials decided to return home after long hours of inhumane treatment at the Abraq Airport where the team was abandoned for more than 15 hours.
In a 20 point paragraph released, the Nigeria Football Federation, NFF, detailed how the Libyans frustrated all efforts by the NFF to honour the match despite their ordeals in the hands of Libyans.
The NFF stresses that they did all they could within their means to ensure the integrity of the game but has no choice but to pull out of the match for safety and health reasons after the conditions became unbearable.
On the side, the Libya Football Federation accused the NFF of not cooperating with them for a successful hosting of the second leg.
The Libyan Football Federation said that the NFF did not cooperate with it in any way, both in the first or second leg of the qualifier.
The Libyan FF clarified that what the Nigerian team was exposed to in the first leg ‘ do not equal a small part of what the Libyan national team was exposed to in the first leg match,” the statement said.
They went ahead to condemn the NFF action and threatened legal actions against NFF then apologised to their fans directing all the blame to Nigeria Football Federation for the botched returned leg originally scheduled to hold on Tuesday, October 15 2024.
Meanwhile the Confederation of African Football, CAF, confirmed that It has been in contact with the Libyan and Nigerian authorities after the body said it has been contacted over the matter, as ” the players of the Super Eagles and the technical team were stranded in disturbing conditions for several hours at an airport that they were allegedly instructed to land by the Libyan authorities”.
The body said the matter has been referred to the CAF Disciplinary Board ‘ for investigation and appropriate action will be taken against those who violated the CAF Statutes and Regulations,” said in a statement.
