Social Media more than propping the GPL up

Unless you’ve been outside this country for the past few years – even so, with news traversing the globe at break-neck speed these days, you couldn’t have missed it – you would have heard all that’s been said about the Ghana Premier League going comatose – even dead.

That conclusion results from a long list of pretty serious symptoms: including, but not limited to, poor playing surfaces, an ‘all-time’ low level of patronage and general interest, below-par quality of play, the rapid exodus of the few truly top players that light up the championship, tactical bankruptcy, low technical know-how, terrible officiating, violence at match centres, the failure of Ghanaian teams to make any significant impact in continental competitions, and – chief among them all – the difficulty in attracting sponsorship by clubs and the league itself.

Even worse, it doesn’t look like much is being done to iron out those flaws. The Ghana Football Association seems to lack enough ideas to inspire the overhaul the top-flight cries out for, and the few they come up with either fall flat or are dismissed outright by those who appear to have their criticism of the league etched in stone and on autoplay. Club officials and fans never really learn from the punitive measures taken against them for misbehaviour, while officiating remains so bad that two of the country’s top referees recently received life-long bans from the sport. And, oh, need I mention that, for yet another season, the GPL is without a headline sponsor?

Rather bleak, you’d say.

Well, not quite.

Salvation and a revival has arrived for the GPL, albeit from a most unlikely source: social media, with the platform of Twitter leading the charge. Right now, it could be argued that the GPL’s biggest, most passionate fanbase exists on Twitter, with many frequenting the various venues.

The banter isn’t just sustained by individuals, however, with pages – official or otherwise – springing up nearly daily. Each of the GPL’s 16 clubs run Twitter accounts (three verified thus far), albeit with varying degrees of professionalism, and the exchanges between them – especially ahead of crunch fixtures – is a pleasure to behold. Little wonder the GPL and related subjects are often among the top trends in the Ghanaian Twitter community, particularly on matchdays!

Such activity hasn’t gone unnoticed, of course, with GFA boss Kwesi Nyantakyi acknowledging it in the immediate aftermath of the opening round of the new season last week.

“The social media trends all had the Ghana Premier League in top place over the weekend and it demonstrated the level of interest among Ghanaians,” Nyantakyi, also vice-president of the Confederation of African Football, gushed in a media interaction.

Okay, so maybe Nyantakyi milked it a bit, but his observation isn’t wide of the mark, is it?

In fact, as an extra nod to the social media effect, the FA – shrewd enough not to miss out on its gains and all the good vibes – set up a Twitter account for the GPL ahead of the 2018 campaign that has already picked up some 14,000 followers.

It’s not been all fun and games, though, as criticism is delivered when merited – that aimed at the freshly unveiled yet aesthetically depressing GPL logo is a valid case in point. Still, the league’s more concerning negatives are regarded in perspective, with the overall picture far more pleasing and encouraging than the worthless, practically dead-and-buried product mourned on mainstream media week-in, week-out. On-air, where it once thrived in its prime, the GPL has had its obituary read at each turn; in social media and its increasingly powerful reach, though, the GPL has found redemption and connected to life support. It’s not yet fully conscious, no, but at least it does more than merely breathe.

To all those who make this possible each day with constructive tweets and posts, selflessly performing the CPR which steadily ticks the GPL’s pulse along – Felix Romark, Nana Yaw Frempong Ampomah, Kelvin Owusu-Ansah, Muftawu Abdulai Nabila, Jerome Otchere, Fredrick Gyan-Mante, James Sowah, Abdul Osman Wadudu, Fentuo Tahiru, Fiifi Anaman, Joel Hammond, Anwar Umar Larry, et al – do keep the good work up. The GPL is thankful to – and counting on – y’all!