By Victor Kanayo
Confederation of African Football, (CAF) will on Wednesday February 1, 2023, hold the draw ceremony for this year’s Africa U17 Cup of Nations.
Heritage Times HT reports that the ceremony will take place at the Cercle Nationale d’Armee in Algiers, capital city of Algeria, host nation for the U17 soccer event which kicks off April 8.
Five-time world champions Nigeria is one of 12 countries whose names will go into the pot for the draw.
According to the organisers, other participating continental teams including ; Algeria, Morocco, Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Somalia, South Sudan, Zambia, South Africa, Cameroon and Congo, will take part during the draws.
Thereafter, the 12 teams will know their group phase opponents for the tournament scheduled between April 8 and 30.
They will be drawn into three groups of four teams each.
At the end of the tournament, the four top-placed teams will qualify to represent Africa at 2023 FIFA U20 World Cup finals taking place in Indonesia later on.
Nigeria have won the global version of the tournament, which produced football stars like Victor Osimhen, Kelechi Iheanacho among others, record five times.