Former Ghana International Stephen “Tornado” Appiah is attributing his scandal-free era as captain to the all-inclusive strategy he employed during his days as skipper of the Ghana Blackstars.
Speaking in an interview with Evans Amawugah on SVTV Africa, Appiah said captaincy was more than wearing the armband during a football game.
According to him, he made it a point to make all the players feel needed including players who were always on the bench.
“During my time, I made everyone feel they were part of the team. I remember I sometimes had to randomly select a player to go and grant interviews even though they were not getting playing time.
Appiah said this act of his helped the players develop love for the team and earned him the respect that came with his position as captain.
The former Blackstars skipper said even though there were problems at their camp sometimes, the team handled issues very well and the public never got to know anything.
According to Appiah, things have changed as compared to their time. He explained the increasing number of media outlets is a reason why internal matters at the camp are always in the public domain because each player has a media friend whom they give information to.
“Every player has their own media friend. I quiet remember we were having a meeting during the 2014 World Cup in Brazil and a journalist texted me to find out if a certain incident had indeed happened during the meeting.”
Appiah, however, described this act of players as not helping the team and is, therefore, calling them to order to desist from leaking information to their journalist friends.
