| 2022–23TotalEnergies CAF Champions League | |
|---|---|
Stade Mohammed V hosted the podium whereAl Ahly lifted the trophy | |
| Tournament details | |
| Dates | Qualification: 10 September – 20 October 2022
|
| Teams | Main Competition: 16 Total: 58 (from 46 associations) |
| Final positions | |
| Champions | |
| Runners-up | |
| Tournament statistics | |
| Matches played | 62 |
| Goals scored | 136 (2.19 per match) |
| Top scorer(s) | (6 goals each) |
2023–24 → (Note: All statistics do not include qualifying play-offs) | |
The2022–23 CAF Champions League (officially the2022–23TotalEnergies CAF Champions League for sponsorship purposes)[1] was the 59th season ofAfrica's premier clubfootball tournament organized by theConfederation of African Football (CAF) and the 27th under the currentCAF Champions League title.
Unlike the last three seasons, the final of this edition was played in a two-legged format as per the decision ofCAF at the executive committee meeting on July 3 atRabat, arising from a formal complaint made byAl Ahly toCAF over the choice ofStade Mohammed V inCasablanca as the venue for the2022 final: despite the intention that the final be played at a neutral venue, the 2022 tournament culminated with the stadium being the home venue of their opponent,Wydad AC.[2][3][4][5][6][7]
The winners,Al Ahly for the record-extending 11th title, automatically qualified for the2023–24 CAF Champions League and earned the right to play against the winners of the2022–23 CAF Confederation Cup in the2023 CAF Super Cup along with the2023 FIFA Club World Cup in Saudi Arabia.[8]
Wydad AC were the defending champions, but they lost thefinal againstAl Ahly.
A total of 46 out of the 56 CAF member associations entered this season's CAF Champions League, with the 12 highest ranked associations according to theirCAF 5-year ranking eligible to enter two teams in this season.[8] As a result, theoretically a maximum of 68 teams could enter the tournament – although this level has never been reached.
For this season of the tournament, CAF used the 2018–2022CAF 5-year ranking, which calculates points for each entrant association based on their clubs’ performance over those 5 years in CAF club competitions. The criteria for points are as follows:[9][10][11]
| CAF Champions League | CAF Confederation Cup | |
|---|---|---|
| Winners | 6 points | 5 points |
| Runners-up | 5 points | 4 points |
| Losing semi-finalists | 4 points | 3 points |
| Losing quarter-finalists | 3 points | 2 points |
| 3rd place in groups | 2 points | 1 point |
| 4th place in groups | 1 point | 0.5 point |
The points are multiplied by a coefficient according to the year as follows:
The following 58 teams from 46 associations participated in this edition of the competition.
Associations are shown according to their2018–2022 CAF 5-year ranking – those with a ranking score have their rank and score (in parentheses) indicated.
Notes:
The official competition schedule was released on 24 June 2022 on their website to prepare the qualified teams for the upcoming season.[12]
| Phase | Round | Draw date | First leg | Second leg |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Qualifying rounds | First round | 9 August 2022 | 9–11 September 2022 | 16–18 September 2022 |
| Second round | 7–9 October 2022 | 14–16 October 2022 | ||
| Group stage | Matchday 1 | 12 December 2022 | 10–11 February 2023 | |
| Matchday 2 | 17–18 February 2023 | |||
| Matchday 3 | 24–25 February 2023 | |||
| Matchday 4 | 7–11 March 2023 | |||
| Matchday 5 | 17–18 March 2023 | |||
| Matchday 6 | 31 March – 1 April 2023 | |||
| Knockout stage | Quarter-finals | 5 April 2023 | 21–22 April 2023 | 28–29 April 2023 |
| Semi-finals | 12–13 May 2023 | 19–20 May 2023 | ||
| Final | 4 June 2023 | 11 June 2023 | ||
The draw for the qualifying rounds was held on 9 August 2022 at the CAF headquarters inCairo,Egypt.[13][14][15]
In the qualifying rounds, each tie was played on a home-and-awaytwo-legged basis. If the aggregate score was tied after the second leg, theaway goals rule was applied, and if still tied,extra time was not played, and thepenalty shoot-out was used to determine the winner (Regulations III. 13 & 14).
Notes:
The 16 winners of the second round advanced to thegroup stage, while the 16 losers of the second round entered theCAF Confederation Cup playoff round.
The draw for the group stage was held on 12 December 2022, 12:00GMT (14:00local time,UTC+2), at the CAF headquarters inCairo, Egypt.[18] The 16 winners of thesecond round ofqualifying were drawn into four groups of four.
The teams were seeded by their performances in the CAF competitions for the previous five seasons (CAF 5-year ranking points shown next to every team). Each group contained one team from each of Pot 1, Pot 2, Pot 3, and Pot 4, and each team was allocated to the positions in their group according to their pot.
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In the group stage, each group was played on a home-and-awayround-robin basis. The winners and runners-up of each group advanced to thequarter-finals of theknockout stage.
| Tiebreakers |
|---|
The teams were ranked according topoints (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss). If tied on points, tiebreakers were applied in the following order (Regulations III. 20 & 21):
|
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification | WAC | JSK | APL | ASV | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 6 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 7 | 1 | +6 | 13 | Advance toknockout stage | — | 3–0 | 1–0 | 1–0 | ||
| 2 | 6 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 5 | −1 | 10 | 1–0 | — | 1–0 | 2–1 | |||
| 3 | 6 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 5 | −2 | 7 | 0–2 | 0–0 | — | 1–0 | |||
| 4 | 6 | 1 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 6 | −3 | 4 | 0–0 | 1–0 | 1–2 | — |
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification | MDS | ASC | HIL | CSG | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 14 | 7 | +7 | 14 | Advance toknockout stage | — | 5–2 | 1–0 | 2–1 | ||
| 2 | 6 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 14 | 8 | +6 | 10[a] | 2–2 | — | 3–0 | 3–0 | |||
| 3 | 6 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 6 | 6 | 0 | 10[a] | 1–1 | 1–0 | — | 2–0 | |||
| 4 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 3 | 16 | −13 | 0 | 1–3 | 0–4 | 1–2 | — |
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification | RCA | SSC | HAC | VSC | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 6 | 5 | 1 | 0 | 17 | 3 | +14 | 16 | Advance toknockout stage | — | 3–1 | 2–0 | 5–0 | ||
| 2 | 6 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 10 | 7 | +3 | 9 | 0–3 | — | 7–0 | 1–0 | |||
| 3 | 6 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 12 | −8 | 7 | 1–3 | 1–0 | — | 2–0 | |||
| 4 | 6 | 0 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 10 | −9 | 2 | 1–1 | 0–1 | 0–0 | — |
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification | EST | CRB | ZSC | MSC | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 6 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 6 | 4 | +2 | 11 | Advance toknockout stage | — | 0–0 | 2–0 | 1–0 | ||
| 2 | 6 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 2 | +2 | 10 | 0–1 | — | 2–0 | 1–0 | |||
| 3 | 6 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 7 | 9 | −2 | 7 | 3–1 | 0–1 | — | 4–3 | |||
| 4 | 6 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 7 | −2 | 5 | 1–1 | 1–0 | 0–0 | — |
The mechanism of the draws for each round was as follows:
| Group | Winners | Runners-up |
|---|---|---|
| A | ||
| B | ||
| C | ||
| D |
The bracket was decided after the draw for the knockout stage, which was held on 5 April 2023.[19]
| Quarter-finals | Semi-finals | Final | |||||||||||||||
| 0 | 1 | 1 | |||||||||||||||
| 1 | 1 | 2 | |||||||||||||||
| 0 | 0 | 0 | |||||||||||||||
| 3 | 1 | 4 | |||||||||||||||
| 2 | 0 | 2 | |||||||||||||||
| 0 | 0 | 0 | |||||||||||||||
| 2 | 1 | 3 | |||||||||||||||
| 1 | 1 | 2 | |||||||||||||||
| 1 | 0 | 1 (3) | |||||||||||||||
| 0 | 1 | 1 (4) | |||||||||||||||
| 0 | 2 | 2 | |||||||||||||||
| 0 | 2 | 2 | |||||||||||||||
| 1 | 1 | 2 | |||||||||||||||
| 4 | 2 | 6 | |||||||||||||||
| Team 1 | Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score | Team 2 | 1st leg | 2nd leg |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simba | 1–1(3–4p) | 1–0 | 0–1 | |
| Al Ahly | 2–0 | 2–0 | 0–0 | |
| CR Belouizdad | 2–6 | 1–4 | 1–2 | |
| JS Kabylie | 1–2 | 0–1 | 1–1 |
| Team 1 | Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score | Team 2 | 1st leg | 2nd leg |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Espérance de Tunis | 0–4 | 0–3 | 0–1 | |
| Wydad AC | 2–2 (a) | 0–0 | 2–2 |
The first leg was played on 4 June, and the second leg was played on 11 June 2023.
| Team 1 | Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score | Team 2 | 1st leg | 2nd leg |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Al Ahly | 3–2 | 2–1 | 1–1 |
| Wydad AC | 1–1 | |
|---|---|---|
| Report |
|
Al Ahly won 3–2 on aggregate.
| Rank | Player | Team | MD1 | MD2 | MD3 | MD4 | MD5 | MD6 | QF1 | QF2 | SF1 | SF2 | F1 | F2 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 6 | ||||||||||
| 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | ||||||||||||
| 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 5 | ||||||||||
| 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | ||||||||||||
| 5 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 4 | |||||||||||
| 1 | 3 | ||||||||||||||
| 2 | 1 | 1 | |||||||||||||
| 1 | 2 | 1 | |||||||||||||
| 1 | 2 | 1 | |||||||||||||
| 1 | 2 | 1 | |||||||||||||