Two Sundowns games frozen, more hanging in the balance

Mamelodi Sundowns’ progression to the CAF Champions League quarter-finals has immediately forced two of their domestic fixtures to be moved to a new date.  

Sundowns secured their passage to the knockout stages of the premier club competition on the continent with victory away at Mauritania champions FC Nouadhibou.

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This means they will now be fixtured by CAF to play the two-legged quarter-final on March 29-30 and April 5-6.

The Brazilians’ opponents will be determined by what happens in their match against TP Mazembe on Saturday with the group winners seeded while the runners-up will be unseeded.

In the quarter-final draw scheduled for March, the seeded teams will be drawn against the unseeded teams with the seeded teams playing the first leg away with teams that were in the same group not fixtured against each other. 

With the CAF competitions the priority, Sundowns’ league games against SuperSport United (March 30) and the trip to Cape Town Spurs (April 6) will now have to be squeezed to alternative dates.

If Sundowns progress to the Champions League semi-finals to be played on April 19-20 and April 26-27, it means the league match against Sekhukhune United (April 27) will be postponed.

The Champions League final is pencilled in for May 19 and May 26 and if the Brazilians make it to that stage, it will throw the last two rounds of DStv Premiership fixtures into disarray.

Round 29 and 30 fixtures of the league have been lined up to be played at the same time on May 18 and May 25 with Sundowns due to play Stellenbosch and Cape Town City on those two dates. 

Sundowns remain alive in the Nedbank Cup whose final is set for June 1 with the FIFA calendar week (June 3-11) coming