Awash with fossil fuel money, African football is sowing the seeds of its own destruction | David Goldblatt

As Afcon kicks off under an oil firm's banner, it is a tragic irony that the climate crisis is making the game ever more unsafe to play outdoors

This Saturday, the Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) - or to give the competition its full title, the TotalEnergies Afcon 2023 - the continent's biennial international men's football tournament, will kick off in Ivory Coast. The main point of interest, in the British sports press atany rate, is the impact that this will have on the course of the Premier League, where the leading teams will, mid-season, be losing their African star players for up to six weeks. Less remarked on, perhaps, is that Afcon 2023 is actually being played in 2024, and that its title is so prominently linked to the French hydrocarbon giant.

For more than half a century, the tournament has been played in January and February but, in an effort to placate the needs of a few European leagues and clubs, the Confederation of African Football (Caf) had originally scheduled this edition for June and July 2023. However, those dates coincided with west Africa's rainy season, and under conditions of climate crisis the region has become more vulnerable to more extreme weather events at this time of year.