4-Nation Tourney: UAE take on Benin

Ghana will host Togo, the United Arab Emirates and Benin in a mini-football tournament this weekend.

According to officials, the four-nation tournament is to test Ghana’s readiness to host football’s African Cup of Nations (CAN 2008) in January.

“This is a test run for us to see whether we are ready,” says Paa Kwesi Plange, spokesman for the CAN 2008 Local Organising Committee.

“We have co-ordinators for accommodation, protocol, transportation, media, marketing and all. So at all these levels we are engaging all our co-ordinators as part of arrangements for the main tournament in January.”

The tournament begins today, with a match between Benin and the UAE. Tomorrow, Ghana takes on Togo. The winners of these two fixtures will meet in the final on Wednesday, November 21 to determine the winner of the tournament. The Ghana Football Association, which is spending about one million dollars to stage the four-nation tournament, also hopes that it will provide a good platform to further prepare the national team for the CAN 2008. “At least we are going to get our objective of getting the boys to play two strong matches within a period of four or five days. That for us means a lot,” Fred Pappoe of the GFA says.

“These boys haven’t played in Accra for about two years; some of them haven’t played in Accra at all and we wouldn’t want to wait until January for them to be introduced to the city on a very electric competitive platform.”