FKF Want Malian Ref At The Centre Of Gor Disallowed Goal Saga Suspended

6th March 2019 - by Mutwiri Mutuota

Local federation writes a complaint to CAF slamming the performance of Boubou Traore in K'Ogalo 0-1 loss to NA Hussein Dey in the Confed Cup last Sunday

Turkish head coach of Kenya's Gor Mahia, Hassan Oktay, reacts during the CAF Confereration cup against Egypt's Zamalek at Kasarani Stadium in Nairobi, Kenya, on Februrary 3, 2019. Kenya's Gor Mahia won by 4-2 against Egypt's Zamalek. PHOTO/AFP

SUMMARY

This is after FKF registered a formal complaint with the Confederations of African Football decrying poor officiating where it slammed Boubou Traore terming his performance in the highly charged Pool D match of the 2018/19 CAF Confederations Cup as 'falling way short of the standard that should be considered acceptable."
The top two finishers will qualify for the quarterfinals of the second-tier continental competition with Pool D finely poised ahead of the last two rounds of group matches
CAF was forced to deal with the bitter fall-out from a hotly contested North African derby where the match between Ismaily of Egypt and Club Africain of Tunisia in the top tier Champions League turned chaotic and was abandoned in the 83rd minute

NAIROBI, Kenya- The Football Kenya Federation (FKF) has called on the Malian centre referee at the centre of the controversy that saw SportPesa Premier League champions, Gor Mahia FC denied a legitimate looking goal in their 0-1 loss to NA Hussein Dey last Sunday in Algiers, Algeria to be suspended from officiating.

This is after FKF registered a formal complaint with the Confederations of African Football decrying poor officiating where it slammed Boubou Traore terming his performance in the highly charged Pool D match of the 2018/19 CAF Confederations Cup as 'falling way short of the standard that should be considered acceptable."

Besides showing five yellow cards to the SPL titleholders who are in Egypt ahead of Sunday's crunch encounter against five-time African champions, Zamalek FC, Traore disallowed a seemingly genuine second half goal from Uganda defender, Shafik Batambuze.

Had Gor (six) forced a 1-1 result in Algiers, they would have been top of the group but defeat saw Hussein Dey leapfrog them to the summit on seven points with Zamalek (five) who beat hosts Petro Atletico (four) in Luanda by also 1-0 moving up to third at the expense of the Angolans.

The top two finishers will qualify for the quarterfinals of the second-tier continental competition with Pool D finely poised ahead of the last two rounds of group matches.

"We would like to single out the performance of the Centre Referee, Mr. Boubou Traore. The specific criticism of his performance is during the 58th minute where he disallowed a goal scored by the visiting team from a video kick.

Attacking players

"From the video obtained from CAF on the match highlights, it is evident there was no contact/infringement from the attacking players on the goalkeeper neither was there an offside call it being a corner kick and as such, we would like to seek clarification from CAF as to why the goal was disallowed," FKF further said in the letter copied to Gor.

The local federation asked the continental football governing body to consider the reports of the CAF Referee Assessor/CAF Match Commissioner for the match as well as reviewing the video of the incident to form a view about 'the acceptability of Mr. Traore's performance, and of his suitability to referee future matches.'

The incident in question sparked outrage in Kenya with many past stars and football fans flooding social media to slam CAF for the dubious standards of officiating at continental tournaments in favour of teams from North Africa.

It was not the first time for suspect officiating to cause anger in this season's continental competitions.

CAF was forced to deal with the bitter fall-out from a hotly contested North African derby where the match between Ismaily of Egypt and Club Africain of Tunisia in the top tier Champions League turned chaotic and was abandoned in the 83rd minute.

The visitors were leading 1-2 when fans threw objects on the pitch angered at a refereeing decision that did not go the home team's way.

After initially disqualifying Ismaily from the Champions League on January 23, the Egyptian titans were reinstated upon appeal on February 10 but their Tunisian rivals were awarded a 3-0 victory.

Gor did not return to Kenya following their loss in Algiers, travelling to Egypt on Monday and will be based in Alexandria before travelling to Cairo to face Zamalek on Sunday.

The record 17-time domestic titleholders stunned the five-time African champions 4-2 in the opening round of Pool D action in Nairobi on February 3.