Ghana sad over CANAF 2011 failure

Francis Adjetey Sowah, President of the Ghana Amputee Football Federation (GAFF) has revealed his frustration over the national Amputee football team’s failure to make true the ‘host and win’ wish as the Cup of African Nations for Amputee Football (CANAF 2011) drew to a close last Saturday. A furious Mr. Adjetey-Sowah is blaming Ghana’s failure to annex the newly christened Atta Mills trophy on the complacency of Black Challenge technical team led by Ali Jahraa especially as Ghana led 2-0 in the final against defending champions Liberia.

The Liberians beat the Ghanaian hosts 3-2 on penalties after a 3-3 draw to take away as first recipients, the Atta Mills trophy aptly named after the Ghana President who donated the huge trophy as well as the medals for the competition.

“I’m disappointed in the fact that if you were leading 2-0 from the first half then second half you come and change the game. We lost from the bench. Ali Jahraa has done very well for us but I don’t know if he communicated with the rest of the technical team before making the second half changes. We lost from the bench and it’s so sad,” an obviously disappointed Adjetey-Sowah minced no words on Asempa FM yesterday.

Mr. Adjetey Sowah who is also the President of AFFA (Amputee Football Federation of Africa), is however counting the pluses of the 3rdedition of the continental championship. He believes the tournament has made strides since the maiden edition in Sierra Leone four years ago, and is expecting bigger things at the next competition.

“We struggled to get a headline sponsor which made financing the tournament a bit difficult. All the big companies were a bit skeptical that what this game is. Well I think many people have seen it now and next time they will be willing to help.

“We’ve progressed because the first tournament, there were only 3 teams. There were four at the 2nd competition and this time we had 6 teams even though we were expecting 8. Next time I believe it will be bigger,” Adjetey Sowah has declared.