Ghana will face Nigeria for a place at the 2024 African Nations Championship (CHAN) after the West African rivals were paired together at the qualifying draw on Wednesday.

The sides also met ahead of the 2022 finals, with Ghana qualifying via a penalty shoot-out following a 2-2 draw on aggregate.

The 42 entrants for the 2024 tournament, which is for domestic-based players on the continent, have been split into six regional zones.

Five of the zones will provide three qualifiers each but the Cecafa region has been handed a fourth space because Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda will all be involved in the preliminaries despite qualifying automatically as joint hosts.

The Confederation of African Football (Caf) says the team “achieving the best result in the Cecafa qualifiers” will advance.

As a result the finals, which will be held from 1-28 February next year, will feature 19 teams – an increase on the 18-team 2022 edition.

The format of the tournament is yet to be announced.

The two rounds of regional qualifiers will take place on a home-and-away basis, with the second round ending on 27-29 December.

Two-time winners Morocco, 2011 champions Tunisia and 2014 winners Libya are the only entrants from the North African region, so are all guaranteed a place at the finals.

CHAN holders Senegal will face either Sierra Leone or Liberia in the second round of qualifying.

Caf has increased the prize money from the previous edition by 60%, with the winners of the 2024 finals set to receive $2m (£1.53m).

The staging of the 2024 CHAN finals in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda is being seen as a test event before the East African neighbours host the 2027 Africa Cup of Nations.

Guardiola, 53, and Begiristain, 60, have a long association, having played alongside each other for Barcelona and Spain.

Begiristain became director of football at Barcelona in 2003 and was influential in Guardiola being named the Spanish giants’ manager in 2008.

“When nobody else would take a risk on me, when maybe three per cent of the people at Barca believed in me, he was the one who insisted on my appointment to the first team,” Guardiola said previously., external

“None of this would have been possible without him.”

It is why Begiristain’s exit could be seen as the start of the break-up of the Catalan inspired success at City, which includes chief executive Ferran Soriano, who also used to work at Barcelona.

Begiristain left Barcelona in 2010 and took up the director of football role at Manchester City two years later, before being reunited with Guardiola in 2016.

Speaking in 2021 about Begiristain, Guardiola said of their relationship: “He is the most humble person I ever met. He never goes to the media. Always, the success is for the other ones. He is always behind the scenes.

“You don’t find these type of people in this world because their egos are always so high – and I put myself as an example [of that].

“He always gives the credit to the players, to the manager, for the chairman, and the chief executive.

“That’s why it’s a pleasure working with him because I can do my job completely free, accepting the good moments and the bad moments and sharing together.

“In the bad moments we are closer than ever and in good moments we celebrate together with a glass of wine.”

The addition of Lee Bonis to the Northern Ireland squad would appear to be a direct consequence of his goalscoring exploits for his new club ADO Den Haag in recent weeks as the former Irish League striker has settled in at his new club, culminating in that treble on Friday evening.

Northern Ireland’s strikers have found goals hard to come by, so the inclusion of the in-form Bonis, despite being untested at international level, adds some more potential firepower for boss Michael O’Neill while he awaits international clearance for prolific Ross County forward Ronan Hale.

Callum Marshall, Dion Charles, Josh Magennis and Jamie Reid, the strikers named in the original squad, have scored just 15 goals in 109 games for the national side.

O’Neill will be hoping for no further injury absentees, having already had to plan without first-choice goalkeeper Bailey Peacock-Farrell and defender Dan Ballard, while still getting accustomed to life without Manchester United’s Jonny Evans, who has retired from international football.

Balmer also moved from Larne to ply his trade in the professional game in England, and now Scotland. He is another in the latest of a number of promising young players keen to impress the NI boss and make his way on the international stage.

Uncapped duo Curtis Jones and Tino Livramento have been added to the senior England squad for this week’s Nations League matches.

Liverpool midfielder Jones earned his first call-up in May as part of Gareth Southgate’s provisional 33-man squad for Euro 2024, but did not make the final cut.

The 23-year-old was part of the Young Lions side that won the 2023 European Under-21 Championship under current England interim boss Lee Carsley.

Newcastle full-back Livramento was part of Carsley’s senior squad for last month’s games against Republic of Ireland and Finland but did not feature.

Captain Harry Kane again trained away from the rest of the squad at St George’s Park on Wednesday but is expected to be fit.

Manchester City midfielder Jack Grealish also missed training as a precaution with a minor knock.

The Three Lions host Greece at Wembley on Thursday before playing Finland in Helsinki on Sunday.

GMP are one of several organisations who regularly communicate with WSL clubs to ensure security at matches.

However, it is ultimately the clubs’ decision on whether they want to allow players to continue to sign autographs after matches.

Manchester City manager Gareth Taylor says it is “a difficult decision” for clubs to come to as they want to maintain the authenticity of the women’s game.

City have several high-profile players in their squad including England internationals Alex Greenwood and Lauren Hemp, as well as Netherlands striker Vivianne Miedema and Japanese star Yui Hasegawa.

But having witnessed first-hand the growing crowds and pressure on players to make time for fans, Taylor supports City’s controlled signing sessions.

“We try to do it now in a more guided way. We have a specific amount of players. We do an alleyway, where it’s more controlled,” said Taylor.

“Sometimes after games, you [would] ask security guards and they would say ‘this is bonkers, we’re going to have an accident one day’. So you see it from both sides.”

Elsewhere, Tottenham are continuing to review the situation at their home ground Brisbane Road, while Arsenal are playing more games at the Emirates Stadium.

Spurs boss Robert Vilahamn said clubs “always need to check security for players” but insisted they have a “really good bond with fans” and they want to keep that.

There are mixed views among players.

England goalkeeper Mary Earps was one of the first to highlight the difficulty in keeping fans happy after receiving criticism for not signing an autograph in 2023.

Chelsea defender Lucy Bronze, who has played at Barcelona, Lyon and Manchester City in recent years, said the measures have been taken to keep the fans safe, as well as players.

“Not every stadium is ready for this volume of fans. The fans are used to having that reaction with players, which we love as well, but at the end of the day you can’t speak to every fan,” said Bronze.

“We still have those interactions. Although I might not be signing [autographs] I still get to see them and that’s what I enjoy.

“Signing a piece of paper is nice, I get that, but I know when I was a fan I went to watch [ex-England international] Rachel Yankey and thought, ‘Whoa, this is amazing’.

“I didn’t need the picture and signature to go with that.”

Against those two teams, who met last night at Stamford Bridge, you would once more expect Celtic to be in the unfamiliar position as the underdog, the team on the back foot.

Though that eventually transpired in Hamilton, the SWPL champions came flying out of the blocks, relishing the challenge in front of them.

But once the excitement of their new surroundings wore off, reality soon hit.

Twente – competing in the competition for the 10th time – were streetwise. They know what this competition demands. They rode out the early wave of Celtic’s energy then pounced and pinned them into their own defensive third. They toyed with the hosts at times.

“We are where we are but we need to get fitter, we need to control the ball when we have it, we need to be brave and play out from the pressure like we did in the first 15 minutes,” Sadiku added.

“The movement, the pace with and without the ball. When we defend that much, we need to be fitter so that when we have the ball, we can relax.

“We concede the first goal late in the half, does that have something to do with fatigue? The second goal, we concede late in the game, so could that have something to do with it?”

“We’ll learn from this and take confidence, because they should be confident.”

That confidence comes from a second-half rally. As they did in the first, Celtic came out quick and alert from the restart and created chances they should have made count.

But ultimately they didn’t, and Kayleigh van Dooren’s late goal ensured a Twente victory. A stage this grand is unforgiving, as Celtic discovered.

It is all a learning curve, though. This is unchartered territory for a side few – if any – thought would be dining at this table when Sadiku came in just 10 months ago. A point she is keen to reiterate.

“There are errors we need to fix,” the head coach added.

“I don’t know how much people are expecting from us to be in the top 16, what we’re doing right now is we’re going to fight. We’ll try to do everything to get as many points as possible.

“In January or in the summer, I don’t think anyone expected us to be where we are right now.

“It’s been a great experience, we’ll learn and I think we can really put in a better performance for our next game.”