Ghana loses CHAN qualification slot to Egypt

Ghana's faint hopes of qualifying for the 2018 Africa Nations Championship (CHAN) through the backdoor have been dashed after Egypt were named to replace Morocco in next year's tournament.

Morocco qualified for the tournament after defeating their North African neighbours in the two-legged knock-out qualifiers.

However a decision by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) to award the the hosting rights to Morocco on Saturday means there was the need to replace the Atlas Lions among the team that qualified for the tournament.

As hosts Morocco qualify automatically and there was the need for their other slot to be filled.

This sparked hopes among some Ghanaians that the Black Stars B could be considered as WAFU champions.

But CAF has decided that with Morocco now getting an automatic slot, Egypt who were eliminated by Morocco in the 2018 qualifiers will take the qualifying slot.

The decision was arrived at Saturday during the Confederations of African Football Executive Committee meeting in Lagos, Nigeria.

Four cities namely Agadir, Casablanca, Marrakech and Tangier have been chosen by the Morocco FA as the host cities.

The tournament will run from 12th January to 4th February 2018.

Equatorial Guinea and Ethiopia were also in contention for the rights to stage the continental event which was initially scheduled for Kenya.

Kenya was stripped off the rights on 23rd September for lack of preparedness.

Morocco will be hosting the biennial event for the first time.

Rwanda successfully hosted the last edition won by the DR Congo in 2016.