World football’s governing body FIFA this week informed the South African Football Association that it was opening proceedings due to the fielding of midfielder Teboho Mokoena in their 2-0 win over Lesotho, officials have confirmed.
Mokoena should not have played because he had already collected two cautions in the qualifiers and had to sit out the game with an automatic one-match suspension.
South Africa admitted they had made an error, but FIFA’s delay in opening disciplinary proceedings led to months of speculation in the country that they had gotten away with it, including from coach Hugo Broos.
There was also criticism of FIFA’s slowness in resolving the issue from other countries battling for top place in South Africa's group.
FIFA’s disciplinary code says: "If a team fields a player who is not eligible to participate (due to suspension, registration issues, nationality, etc.), the match is automatically forfeited. The default result is a 3-0 loss, unless the actual result was even more disadvantageous to the offending team."
A three-point deduction would leave South Africa level with Benin on 14 points at the top of Group C with two qualifiers each left, with Nigeria and Rwanda only three points back.
Only the group winners automatically advance to the finals in North America which start next June. The last two rounds of matches are played next month with South Africa away to Zimbabwe and home to Rwanda while Benin finish away at Rwanda and Nigeria.
It will not be the first time a country has been docked points for fielding an ineligible player in African World Cup qualification.
In the 2018 qualifiers, FIFA awarded Algeria a 3–0 win as a result of Nigeria fielding the ineligible Shehu Abdullahi, after their match ended in a 1–1 draw.
Abdullahi failed to serve a one-game ban after receiving two yellow cards in the qualifying competition, but Nigeria still finished top of the group and qualified for the finals in Russia.
Ahead of the 2014 finals in Brazil, the Cape Verde Islands lost out on a playoff spot after using Fernando Varela in their shock group win against Tunisia. He was still suspended, so Tunisia went through to the playoffs instead of the islanders.