By SANDRA MWILA –

THE Confederation of African Football (CAF) has thrown out an appeal by the Federation of Uganda Football Association (Fufa) over allegations that some Zambian players who featured for their Under-17 team are over-age.
Fufa chief executive officer Edgar Watson told AfricanFootball.com on Wednesday that his association received a letter from CAF informing them of the outcome of their appeal.
Uganda were eliminated 4-1 on aggregate by Zambia after losing 2-0 at Nkoloma Stadium in Lusaka before crumbling to 2-1 defeat at Nakivubo Stadium in Kampala on Saturday.
“We received a letter from CAF indicating that our protest was not successful,” said Watson.
Watson said in the letter signed by the Secretary General, CAF told them that according to their details, the Zambian players who Uganda complained about are not over-age as claimed.
Uganda’s protest letter had questioned three players namely Patson Daka, Enock Mwepu and Changwe Kalale, based on some Zambian online publication, which claimed that some players were over-age.
They said the online publications claimed that Kalale was born on March 31, 1997 making him over-age for the 2015 qualifiers.
But Watson said they will meet and see whether to appeal or and move forward.
Interestingly one of the players who Fufa mentioned in the protest, Daka netted three of the goals that saw Zambia qualify for the finals in Niger next year
In 2010, CAF disqualified Uganda’s then Under-17 side after it was discovered that in a 3-1 aggregate win over Zambia in the qualifiers, they fielded an over-age player, Ivan Ntege.
Meanwhile, the Football Association of Zambia (FAZ) says it has always complied with CAF regulations concerning the age of players that are entered for their respective age group competitions.
FAZ communications manager Nkweto Tembwe said at a media briefing at Football House in Lusaka yesterday that all the players that failed the Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) test in the past, have been dropped from the various teams.
“FAZ has continued to comply with the CAF regulations of using MRI tests as standard way of ascertaining the players’ age. The age of players is not determined by the club, or how many games they have played but the MRI tests,” he said.
He said questions on how or why some Under-17 players were playing for some Premier league teams and a number of goals scored should not arise as the age can only be determined by the MRI scan.