In the wake of a growing crisis that has seen 17 African nations stripped of their home-ground advantage due to venue unavailability, South Africa's head coach, Hugo Broos, has issued a fervent call to the Confederation of African Football (CAF).
Broos is urging CAF to take decisive action, proposing a ban on nations unable to host crucial fixtures on their own soil.
The plea comes as Zimbabwe and Lesotho grapple with a stadium crisis during the ongoing 2026 World Cup Qualifiers, forcing them to surrender their home advantage and compete on neutral grounds.
“This one thing I don't understand in African football is that home games are not home games,” he lamented, as reported by IDiski Times.
“I think Zimbabwe will play their home games in South Africa, so we have a little advantage for that game,” he stated, highlighting the unfairness of the current circumstances.
“You can easily say, ‘in five years, if you don't have a stadium, then you don't play CAF games anymore, you don't play AFCON qualifiers and that of the World Cup’,” he suggested, urging CAF to set a clear deadline.
“If you say nothing and those things happen, then the competition is not 100% correct anymore,” he argued.
“I hope one day they will decide by putting a period to say, ‘Okay, if you have not decided on the stadium that you need to have, I'm very sorry, you had those three or four or five years, finished, no qualifiers anymore – no for World Cup or AFCON’. Maybe then, they will do something,”