With South America's World Cup qualifiers kicking off in October, the AFA decided an overhaul critics said should have been made a year ago had to be done at once.
The side did not qualify for the African Nations Cup finals in Gabon starting on 14 January and are next in action when the 2019 Nations Cup qualifiers kick off in March.
The American Jared Palmer, a qualifier, pulled off the day's biggest upset when he beat fifth-seeded Sjeng Schalken of the Netherlands, 5-7, 6-2, 6-2.
However, thanks to a combination of intermittent coverage and at times seemingly willfully obscure scheduling (England's last home Euro 2013 qualifier kicked off after 5pm on a Sunday; the one before that required fans to make their way to and from Swindon on a Thursday evening), only a few are household names.
The 2014 World Cup qualifier kicks off Wales' bid, and by mid-morning on Friday around 20,000 tickets had been sold for the 26,828 capacity venue.
O'Sullivan expects the Lions centre Brian O'Driscoll to be fully fit for the qualifiers despite limping off just before half-time.
Meares, meanwhile, was also making her way to the top, dipping underneath the old Olympic record in the qualifiers, then seeing off Guo Shuang - her semi-final rival - in two hotly disputed rounds.
In the grand scheme of things, this demolition means very little apart from providing further proof that the Euro 2016 qualifiers are worse off for including teams such as Gibraltar.
In Rooney he still possesses his game changer, the striker who has made the crucial first breakthrough in both these qualifiers, even casting off his new protective headband to score against Poland.
Qualifier Martin Gould pulled off a great escape to upset Hong Kong's Marco Fu, this season's Wembley Masters runner-up, with a 10-8 win and set up a last-16 showdown with rising star Judd Trump.
