The 2023/24 season of the CAF African Schools Football Championship is officially underway, as CAF, through its Member Associations Division prepares to roll out the second edition of the ground-breaking youth football tournament as envisioned by CAF President, Dr Patrice Motsepe.
Building on from the success of its inaugural edition, which saw more than 800 000 boys and girls from 28 862 schools across 44 countries, CAF is once again pulling out all the stops to ensure that the innovative concept as brought forth by the CAF President fulfils its objective.
As in the previous edition, the competition is structured into three phases, which is National, Zonal and Continental and affords school-going boys and girls a unique opportunity of being exposed to international football.
In addition to its competitive nature on the field of player, The CAF African Schools Football Championship also affords learners off the field capacity building as part of developing future African leaders.
CAF led initiatives such as the Young Reporters Programme, Young Referee Programme as well as the CAF Safeguarding Programme are some of the unique features that run concurrently with the programme.
With the season already underway at national phase across the continent – CAF, working closely with it’s Zonal Unions is preparing to stage the Zonal Phase of the competition with Togo set to kick things off with the WAFU B edition between 20 – 26 November.
The WAFU B Zone will then be followed by UNIFFAC, COSAFA, CECAFA, UNAF and WAFU A to close off the Zonal Qualifiers ahead of the continental phase set to take place in April 2024.
African Schools Football Championship 2023 Zonal Qualifiers Dates:
| ZONAL UNION | DATE | HOST COUNTRY | CITY |
| WAFU B | 24 – 26 November | Togo | Lomé |
| UNIFFAC | 08 – 10 December | Sao Tome e Principe | Sao Tome |
| COSAFA | 14 – 16 December | Zimbabwe | Harare |
| CECAFA | 14 – 17 December | Kenya | Nairobi |
| UNAF | 18 – 20 December | Egypt | Cairo |
| WAFU A | 19 – 21 December | Guinea | Conakry |
CAF African Schools Football Interesting Statistics:
- 804 480 boys and girls participated in the inaugural edition (Boys 497 580, Girls 306 900).
- 28 862 Schools were engaged during the inaugural edition.
- A total of 44 countries were involved in the competition.
- The Continental Finals took place in Durban, South Africa in April this year.
- Tanzania’s Fountain Gate Dodoma Secondary School won the Continental edition to be crowned overall champions in the girls section.
- CS Ben Sekou Sylla of Guinea were crowned Continental champions at the finals of the competition last season in the boys section.
