By George Osei
It was a particularly good weekend for Ghana football as the nations interest in continental football at club level ended for another year.
Ashantigold bowed out of the CAF Confederations Cup on Sunday leaving Ghana with no representation in either of the continents club competitions.
The women’s national team, the Black Queens also suffered defeat as they lost 0-1 to Ethiopia in a first leg London 2012 Olympic qualifier in Addis Ababa also on Sunday.
All these comes in the wake of impressive displays at international level by the Black Stars who put up excellent outings in the two games they played in the week earlier.
They accounted for Congo Republic 3-0 in an AFCON 2012 qualifier on March 27 in Brazzaville, before playing out a one all draw with England at Wembley Stadium two days later.
Without doubt, Ghana football at national team level (Black Stars), is in a healthy state but the same cannot be said about it at club level.
Last Sunday, Ashantigold needed to overturn a three goal deficit against Etoile Sportive du Sahel of Tunisia at Obuasi to advance to the next stage of the Confederations Cup.
It was always going to be a tall order against such an experienced side and in the end, they could only manage a 2-1 win to go out 4-2 on aggregate.
In the first round of the CAF champions league, Ghanaian champions, Aduana Stars were eliminated by WAC of Morocco on a 3-1 aggregate.
The Black Queens defeat to Ethiopia leaves them with a lot of work to do in their attempt to make it to the London Olympics next year.
They have a lifeline in Accra next week when they host the return fixture hoping to overturn the 0-1 deficit and make it to the final round of qualifiers.
These results and others recorded earlier, has left many to wonder whether the Ghana FA is doing enough to improve standards elsewhere other than the full national team, the Black Stars.
Current happenings could a gloomy future for Ghana football if nothing is done to arrest the situation.
The state of the domestic game is not healthy and the FA knows this. There is too much corruption in the game and it seems the FA has turned a blind eye, focusing their attention elsewhere.
The number of clubs representing Ghana in continental competitions would not be increased as both Aduana Stars and Ashantigold failed to make the necessary impact that could have earned enough points to push our ranking up.
Isn’t it ironic that Africa’s best ranked nation is struggling to put its domestic game together to move it forward in the right direction.
These and other issues are what the FA should be concerned about in addition to how high they want the Black Stars to be regarded in the face of the international public. Email:okotosports@yahoo.com
