Zimbabwe players are threatening to boycott the opening game of the Africa Cup of Nations against host Egypt because they haven’t been paid.

Players and a team official, who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, said a meeting with federation officials at the team hotel on Thursday failed to resolve the standoff.

Zimbabwe are due to open Africa’s top tournament against Egypt on Friday in Cairo.

The players refused to train on the eve of the game and are demanding to be paid their allowances for the tournament, along with allowances and match fees still owed to them from a competition last month.

One of the people with knowledge of the situation said some players had asked to be released from the squad so they could return home.

The Zimbabwe Football Association said in a statement that the game against Egypt would go ahead and there was no strike threat, but that was countered by the five players and the team official who spoke to the AP. They said there was still a deadlock in the negotiations.

A strike would cause more embarrassment for African football after FIFA announced on Thursday that it was taking steps to clean up the continent’s governing body, which is plagued by allegations of corruption against its president.

The Cameroon team are also protesting. They have refused to leave their hotel to board a flight to Egypt because of a players’ pay dispute, a team spokeswoman said on Friday.

The reigning champions are set to start the tournament on Tuesday in a match against Guinea-Bissau, but the players did not appear for their flight on Thursday evening amid a spat over bonus payments.

‘The Lions are still in Yaounde. They did not agree with their managers on the amount of their premiums,’ the spokeswoman told Reuters.

Pay disputes before major competitions are not unusual for African soccer federations who often do not have sufficient resources to pay their players high sums. Nigeria and Ghana have experienced similar problems in recent World Cups.

Ministry of sports spokesman Gabriel Nloga said the players had each been paid a bonus of 20million CFA francs (£27,000). A source at Cameroon’s football federation said the players had asked for twice that.

Two sources close to the negotiations said they expected the team to leave Cameroon later on Friday after the ministry of sport agreed to pay each player a 5million CFA franc bonus after their first tournament victory.

Cameroon has a rich soccer history, with both male and female teams taking part in a number of past World Cups. The women’s team were one of three African teams to qualify for the World Cup taking place in France. They reached the last 16 on Thursday after a 2-1 win over New Zealand.

But the Central African country was last year stripped of its right to host the 2019 Nations Cup due to delays in preparations for the tournament and security concerns.