The Confederation of African Football {CAF} has banned the National Sports Stadium from hosting international matches until outstanding issues noted in previous inspection reports have been addressed.
Some of the outstanding issues which CAF insist should be addressed include Individual seats in the stadium, Electronic Turnstiles, Venue Operations Centre (VOC) and Renovation of B – Arena.
In a statement, CAF said it will give the stadium temporary approval to host only at least one match on senior teams’ international matches and after that the stadium will be barred to host international matches.
“The Confederation of African Football has granted Zimbabwe’s National Sports Stadium a
one-match approval to host senior teams’ international matches. Thereafter, the stadium will
be automatically barred from hosting senior teams’ international matches and other CAF Men’s Inter Club Competitions until outstanding issues noted in previous inspection reports have been addressed,” said CAF
These developments follows the inspection of the facility by CAF’s Tshegofatso Moiloa on 13 & 14 October, when it indicated that the Warriors’ home World Cup qualifier against Ethiopia in November will be the last game that we will play at home.
The National Sports Stadium was initially banned from hosting senior teams’ matches in 2020
but was provisionally cleared later in the same year.
Since then, CAF has been using reports from inspections conducted by ZIFA to extend the temporary approval.
Other facilities in the stadium like VIP chairs are still not up to the required CAF standards hence the stadium needs to be fully modernized and brought up to the international standard requirements.
