{"id":45630,"date":"2026-09-16T10:36:38","date_gmt":"2026-09-16T08:36:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=45630"},"modified":"2026-09-16T10:36:38","modified_gmt":"2026-09-16T08:36:38","slug":"tanzania-uganda-burundi-secure-winning-starts-in-caf-u20-cecafa-qualifiers","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/tanzania-uganda-burundi-secure-winning-starts-in-caf-u20-cecafa-qualifiers\/","title":{"rendered":"Tanzania, Uganda, Burundi secure winning starts in CAF U20 CECAFA qualifiers \u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Hosts Tanzania, Uganda, and Burundi have recorded commanding victories in the opening fixtures of the TotalEnergies Confederation of African Football (CAF) U-20 Africa Cup of Nations Council for East and Central Africa Football Associations (CECAFA) qualifiers held at the newly renovated Uhuru Stadium in Dar es Salaam.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>A total of 16 goals were scored across three opening-day matches, highlighted by Burundi&#8217;s 4-0 victory over South Sudan. Uganda secured a 4-1 win against Djibouti, while defending zonal champions Tanzania defeated Rwanda 3-0 to secure three points in their opening match.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Under the regional tournament structure, the three pool winners and the best-ranked runner-up will advance to the semi-finals.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The two teams that reach the final will earn the CECAFA region&#8217;s qualifying berths for the TotalEnergies CAF U-20 Africa Cup of Nations, scheduled to be hosted in Ghana in 2027.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;ChannelAfrica&#8211;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":15610,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-45630","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Tanzania, Uganda, Burundi secure winning starts in CAF U20","published_date":"2026-09-16 10:35:59","news_description":"Tanzania, Uganda, Burundi secure winning starts in CAF U20","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/45630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/45630\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45631,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/45630\/revisions\/45631"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=45630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}