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ZIMBABWEAN football clubs could benefit from changes which will see the CAF Champions League and Confederation Cup group stages being doubled to 16 teams from next year.

In each competition, 16 clubs will be divided into four groups of four at the pool stage, instead of the current eight teams divided into two groups.

Effective from next season, the new format was announced by CAF president Issa Hayatou on Wednesday.

Hayatou was speaking at CAF Ordinary General Assembly in Mexico.

New FIFA president Gianni Infantino was in attendance at the assembly for the first time since he was elected leader of football’s world governing body.

And Hayatou took the opportunity to highlight his belief that Africa should be given more places at future World Cup tournaments, referring to recent African success at age-restricted tournaments to support his view.

“The Under-17 World cup in 2015 featured two African teams, Nigeria and Mali, who contested the finals, with Nigeria getting the victory,” he said.

“With the Under-20 World Cup (also in 2015), we witnessed inter-African confrontation between Senegal and Mali during the third place game.”

Hayatou also unveiled the CAF’s progression in the wake of the new reforms implemented by FIFA, now at its implementation phase. He mentioned the establishment, composition and the roadmap of a working group on the CAF reforms to delegates representing the 54 member associations.

The working group will be chaired by CAF Executive Committee Mohamed Raouraoua, and are expected to submit their report in the month of September, which will be subject to the approval of the Executive Committee and the General Assembly. For this purpose, an Extraordinary General Assembly has been fixed for Thursday, September 29, 2016 in Cairo, Egypt to proceed with the adoption of the reforms.

In his address, the CAF President highlighted on the report of activities and performance of African teams at major competitions since the last General Assembly, almost a year ago. He laid emphasis on the outstanding performance of African teams at the FIFA U-20 World and FIFA U-17 World Cup, both in 2015.

“It becomes clearly apparent that a better representation of our continent at those levels in the World Cup would just be justice,” said Hayatou. – Cafonline/Sports Reporter