Sundowns’ Caf games moved to Royal Bafokeng Stadium

The Confederation of African Football (Caf) has forced Mamelodi Sundowns to adopt the Royal Bafokeng Stadium as their home venue for their Caf Champions League games.

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This follows inspections conducted at Downs’ three preferred venues – their Loftus Versfeld fortress, their alternative home ground, Lucas Moripe Stadium, and Tuks Stadium.

All three of these capital city venues have been flagged for not meeting Caf standards and Sundowns have since moved to make renovations – at least at the Loftus Versfeld – a venue they share with rugby franchise partner, the Bulls.

Masandawana co-head coach Rulani Mokwena said they were given an option to stage their games at the FNB Stadium, but said they didn’t want to make the home of rival club, Kaizer Chiefs, their temporary home ground.

“Caf were not entirely happy with the stadiums for various reasons, from lacking adequate generators to not being satis- fied with medical facilities, the dugouts and safety of the chairs at the different facilities,” explained Mokwena.

“Caf then proposed that we use the FNB Stadium but the difficulty with that is knowing that our arch rivals use that stadium. Besides, Chiefs are playing a couple of home fixtures on the same dates, so that became a no-go.

“Then Caf recommended that we can use Royal Bafokeng, which suits us. The quality of the facilities and the pitch suit our requirements because we want to use a field that allows us to be dominant and play the way that we want to,” he added.

“There is a lot of red tape and we have no control over that. What we can control is making sure that we prepare the team as well as possible,” he added.

Masandawana kick off the group stages against Sudanese side Al-Hilal Omdurman on Friday before flying out for their first away Group A action on 18 February, when they will face Al-Merreikh in Sudan.