Ahead of the Liberia National Football team’s African Cup of Nations qualifier with South Africa, a high-ranking source within the LFA has confirmed that CAF has approved Liberia to play at home. The Liberia Football Association (LFA) was informed in early February by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) of its decision not to approve the Samuel Kanyon Doe (SKD) Sports Stadium for the upcoming Nations Cup qualifying match involving Liberia and South Africa. However, the latest report from CAF has given Liberia the green light to prepare for their home fixture.
By: Christopher C. Walker 0777898224/0886723075 [email protected]
A top official of the LFA in conversation with the FrontPage Africa Sports desk explained that CAF has satisfied the stadium’s requirements. The LFA official told the reporter that the confirmation document to lift the ban would be sent to Liberia soon. “The designation has been sent to the LFA,” he said.
According to our source, the game will be played in Liberia as scheduled, but it will be a one-off match because everything is not yet in place. The Samuel Kanyon Doe Sports Complex in Paynesville City will once again come alive on continental duty when the nation’s pride and joy, the Lone Star of Liberia, host the Bafana Bafana of South Africa on March 28, 2023. According to the latest referee assignments, Liberia will welcome South Africa on March 28, 2023, at the refurbished Samuel Kanyon Doe Sports Complex in Paynesville at 4 pm. The referee schedule suggests that ongoing work at the SKD facility is satisfactory so far.
The Liberia National Team has never played a competitive match at its home venue, the Samuel Kanyon Doe (SKD) Sports Complex, since October 10, 2019, when the Lone Star defeated Chad’s national team in an AFCON 2019 preliminary rounds qualifying series tie. Since 2019, the Lone Star has not played at their home venue due to an imposed sanction on the stadium by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) for failing to meet international football standards to allow international matches. The 36,000-seated capacity stadium, located outside the nation’s capital city, has been under renovation for years.
In a communication dated back to August 2021, the African sports body said in its communication to the Liberia Football Association (LFA) that due to the need to ensure the best playable conditions in the upcoming qualifying match, the following decisions have now been taken: a prohibition is made to use the SKD Sports Complex or any other stadium in Liberia for the qualifying matches of the World Cup by FIFA, Qatar 2022, starting from the 30 August to 7 September window due to non-compliance as at the time of inspection when the African Soccer body sent an inspection team to assess the stadium ahead of the crucial qualifying game.
It can be recalled that in 2022, nearly two years after a complete renovation of the stadium, the Chief Patron of Sports and former World Footballer of the Year, President George Weah, along with his cabinet ministers, inaugurated the refurbished Samuel Kanyon Doe (SKD) Sports Complex in Paynesville. Passionate football fans await the return of their darling Lone Star, the nation’s pride and joy, to return to the SKD Sports Complex carpet. Hopes of elation came in a twinkle of an hour on February 22, 2023, when the Confederation of African Football (CAF) listed Assignments released for match officials by the body, shortlisted the SKD Sports Complex in Paynesville as the venue for the Group K AFCON qualifier with the Bafana Bafana of South Africa on its official Matchday Website for the rounds 3&4 AFCON 2023 showpiece encounters across the continent.
Since their 1-0 win against CHAD, in 2019, thanks to a Kpah Sherman goal, the Lone Star has been consequently denied a taste of their home soil and became a ‘nomadic’ national team without an official base as they were moved by the Liberia Football Association (LFA) to different venues, across the country, mainly at the Union Sportive de Douala, in Cameroon, the Accra Stadium in Ghana, and most recently the Mohammed V’ Stadium in Casablanca, pending on the readiness of the SKD Sports Complex, through a render financial support, from the Government of Liberia.