THE CAF CHAMPIONS LEAGUE

THE CAF CHAMPIONS LEAGUE

The CAF Champions League is an annual international club football competition run by the Confederation of African Football (CAF). The top club sides from Africa's football leagues are invited to participate in this competition, which is the premier club football competition in the continent and the equivalent to the UEFA Champions League. Due to sponsorship reasons, the official name is Orange CAF Champions League, with Orange Champions League also in use.

The winner of the tournament earns a berth for the FIFA Club World Cup, a tournament contested between the champion clubs from all six continental confederations, and also faces the winner of the CAF Confederation Cup in the following season's CAF Super Cup.

STRUCTURE AND QUALIFICATION

In 1997 the CAF Champions League replaced the previous pan-African competition, the African Cup of Champions Clubs; this had run from 1964–1996.  The competition is open to the winners of all CAF-affiliated national leagues, as well as the holder of the competition from the previous season. From the 2004 competition the runner-up of the league of the 12 highest-ranked countries also entered the tournament creating a 64-team field. This was in response to the merging of the CAF Cup, the secondary pan-African club competition where the league runners-up would previous play, with the CAF Cup Winners' Cup to create the CAF Confederation Cup. The 12 countries would be ranked on the performance of their clubs in the previous 5 years.

The Champions League operates as a knockout competition, with a final group stage, with each tie (including the final) played over two legs - home and away. There are 3 knockout stages: the preliminary stage, the first round (32 teams) and the second round (16 teams). The 8 teams knocked out of the second round are entered into the Confederation Cup to play against the final 8 teams in that competition. After the second round, the last 8 teams are split into two groups of 4. The winner and runner-up in these groups are sent to play in a semi-final for the chance of contesting the final.

North African dominance

Although only two North African teams had ever won the title before 1981 - Egypt's Ismaily in 1969, and Algeria's MC Alger in 1976 - since then, North Africa's teams have dominated the championship, between them winning the title on no fewer than 22 out of the last 28 tournaments.

Particularly dominant have been the two Egyptian giants and Cairo-based arch-rivals, Al Ahly and Zamalek. The Cairo ‘Red Devils’ (Al Ahly) have won it a record eight occasions- in 1982, 1987, 2001, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2012 and 2013; while the Cairo ‘White Knights’ (Zamalek) have taken the honours on five occasions - 1984, 1986, 1993, 1996 and 2002.

The other North African teams that have made a big impression in this tournament are Morocco's Raja Casablanca, who has emerged victorious three times – in 1989, 1997 and 1999, Algeria's JS Kabylie in 1981 and 1990, Algeria's ES Sétif in 1988 and 2014, and Tunisia's Espérance de Tunis in 1994 and 2011. -

Recent developments

Apart from the introduction of the away goals rule (in which the team wins which has scored more goals playing ‘away’ if there is a tie in the aggregate score line over the two legs), very little changed in this competition until 1997. In this year, CAF took the bold step to follow the lead established a few years earlier in UEFA by creating a league stage in the tournament and changing the name to the CAF Champions League. CAF also introduced prize money for participants for the first time.

With a purse of US$1 million on offer to the winners and US$750,000 to the losing finalist, the new Champions League had become the second richest club competition in Africa after the ABSA Premiership worth $2 million. In the new format, the league champions of the respective CAF member countries went through a series of preliminary rounds until a last 16 stage. The 8 winners of this round were then drawn into two mini-leagues of 4 teams each, with each team playing each other on a home and away basis. At the end of the league stage, the top two teams in each group meet in the semifinals, with the winners going through to contest the finals.

From the 2009 season, the winners purse was increased to US$1.5 million and the runners up to US$1 million. In 2010, TP Mazembe of the Democratic Republic of the Congo became the first club ever to repeat as champions on two separate occasions. Their first pair of wins came in 1967 and 1968, before repeating the feat again in 2009 and 2010.

 <script async src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script>
<!-- THE CAF CHAMPIONS LEAGUE -->
<ins class="adsbygoogle"
     style="display:block"
     data-ad-client="ca-pub-6234907972623011"
     data-ad-slot="5945011439"
     data-ad-format="auto"></ins>
<script>
(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});
</script>
Most successful club in the competition.

Egypt's Al Ahly is the most successful club in the competition's history, having won the tournament eight times. Egyptian clubs have accumulated the highest number of victories, winning the title 14 times. The reigning champions are TP Mazembe of DR Congo, who secured their fifth win in the competition after defeating USM Alger in the 2015 Final.