AFCON is disrespected more than any other tournament - Ian Wright

Notwithstanding many efforts from external parties, the

is going to begin on Sunday, January 9, in Cameroon.

The European Club Association issued a letter to FIFA explaining their unwillingness to send their players to play in AFCON as they were concerned that the tournament does not have a suitable medical and operational protocol.

Gianni Infantino

, the FIFA president, supported the notion of postponing the tournament, as he thought it would be better should the AFCON be played in September.

Some club also stopped their players from joining the tournament with their countries, including

striker

Emmanuel Dennis

.

Ian Wright

, the legendary England striker, slammed these entities for denying their players the right to represent their countries and said that if it was the Euros, no one would be talking about postponing it.

“

Is there ever a tournament more disrespected than the Africa Cup of Nations?”

he told 

Sky Sports

.

“There is no greater honour than representing your country. The coverage is completely tinged with racism.

“We played our Euros across 10 countries in the middle of a pandemic and there’s no issue at all. But Cameroon, a single country hosting a tournament, is a problem.

“You are getting journalists asking players … players getting asked if they will be honouring the call-ups to their national teams. Imagine if that was an English player representing the Three Lions. Can you imagine the furore?

“Loads of the best players in Europe right now are African,” noted the 58-year-old, who made 33 appearances for England.

“If we love them at club level, why can’t we love them at international level like their counterparts across the globe? Why is this tournament constantly getting so much flak?” he concluded.

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