BBC Sport Africa reports that four players on the Zambian team are being prevented from competing in the 14th edition of the 2022 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON), held in Morocco from 2nd to 23rd July 2022.

The biennial international women's football tournament is organised by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) which defers to the gender criteria required by global governing body Fifa, introducing testosterone testing for the first time since its inception in 1991.

Fifa limits the amount of naturally-occurring testosterone in female players to certain levels, with players who are over those levels needing to reduce them through medication (or, in extreme cases, surgery) before they are considered eligible to play.

Three players and team captain Barbra Bandra underwent and failed gender verification tests, despite Banda taking medication to help reduce her naturally high levels of testosterone.

“The elephant in the room is to deal with this issue of gender verification, which seems to be discriminatory, in the sense that you seem to have it in this competition [but not others]”, commented Andrew Kamanga, President of Zambia's Football Association, criticising the hypocrisy of these regulations.

“But these are professional players, who are also playing professional football in different leagues, where that requirement doesn't seem to be in tandem with what Caf is asking”, he continued. “Equally, if you take it to the next level in the Fifa competitions, you now start questioning why it should only be enforced in this competition, when it should really cut across all competitions.”

The tournament also doubles as the African qualifiers to the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup.