2013 CAN In South Africa

If you didn't know:
2013 Africa Cup of Nations qualification
The 2013 Africa Cup of Nations will be staged in South Africa after that country struck a deal with Libya to swap their hosting rights from 2017.
The North African country was originally scheduled to act as hosts, but the civil war in that country made it impossible. South Africa, as hosts of the 2017 tournament, stepped in and offered to swap, giving the Libyans more time to prepare.
It will be the second time that South Africa have hosted the continental showpiece, they did so in 1996 as coach Clive Barker led them to the title with a 2-0 final win over Tunisia.
There will once again be 16 nations participating at the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations finals, with South Africa automatically gaining entry as hosts.
For the first time since 1990, all the qualifying matches will be played on a knockout basis without any group action because of the short time between the 2012 finals and 2013 competition.
The 14 winners of the second round ties to be played in February and June will be joined by 16 finalists from the 2012 African Nations Cup finals – Angola, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Equatorial Gabon, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Libya, Mali, Morocco, Niger, Senegal, Sudan, Tunisia and Zambia.
They will go into a draw for a third, and last, round of 15 matches and the winners of those ties, to be played over two legs home and away, will qualify for the finals in South Africa.
The seven countries who have not entered the 2013 Nations Cup qualifiers are the Comoros Islands, Djibouti, Eritrea, Mauritania, Mauritius, Swaziland and Somalia.
( Swaziland withdrew at the preliminary round stage of qualification due to financial constraints within the Football Association.)
* South Africa automatically qualify as host nation.
By Sbue
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