Sulley Muntari has heaped praise upon the 'father figure' Pompey have in Harry Redknapp with what he has told the Pompey site.
He has said that the fantastic run that we are currently on - 11 league games unbeaten spanning more than 3 months - is down to Redknapp's management and how he 'fathers' the players: 'Harry is a great manager and he is like a father figure to us all off the field. He treats us well and that's why everyone is happy and playing so well. It is much easier to do your job when you are happy'.
As well as his praise for his boss he also spoke about the African nations, and much as most of us have his hopes that it can be changed in the future to a more 'sensible' time of year.
His hopes are that this would mean the domestic season would not be disrupted for teams with African footballers in their squads: 'I am just praying that in future they change the timetable and move it to the summer so that we can play for our clubs all the time.
'That is something I feel will benefit everyone and stop all the problems.
'It is certainly something that is possible and the CAF need to look at it'.
The argument many have is that the summer months in African are too hot to be able to play the tournament, but although I am no expert on African climate my thinking was that it is pretty much hot all year round?
If Muntari himself feels that the competition could and should be played during the summer months then surely it is possible to do this in the future?
As far as this African nations goes I think we are all in agreement that Redknapp knew this was coming, so we cannot have any complaints about losing players this time round, but things clearly need to be looked at for future African nations cups as this is either going to put managers off buying Africans or clubs may start pressuring these players into choosing club over country - something that should never be made to happen.
