Stephen Appiah & Samuel Osei Kuffour Honoured

Included in Africa's finest XI 2003

Two Ghanaian male footballers who are regular members of the Black Stars have been honoured by MTN CAF.

The skipper of the senior national team Stephen Appiah who plays for Juventus in Italy and his deputy Samuel Osei Kuffour of Bayern Munich, Germany were honoured for their meritorious service to the game of football.

This was disclosed in Accra by Fouseena Leiba Djagba the West Africa operations director of African Soccer TV, producers of the weekly castle African soccer show and right holders of the MTN CAF Awards.

Miss Djagba said her outfit conducted a series of interviews with the eleven African footballer stars chosen by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) as the Castle Larger Africa's Finest XI for the 2003 at the recent MTN CAF Awards held in Yaounde, Cameroon.

In her submission she emphasised the need for all to be glad that out of a total of fifty-two nations Ghana has had the privilege to have two of its players making the list of Africa's finest XI.

She said it has become necessary to support the nation to make it to the World Cup which has always been a dream.

Mr Kwesi Nyantekye the vice chairman of the GFA said the two players have done the nation proud for this honour and paid tribute to them. He called on their colleagues to also work had to achieve similar feats.

He said the FA is doing everything possible to ensure that the nation makes it to the World Cup and would soon get a very competent coach to take charge of the senior national team.

The Deputy Minister of Education, Youth and Sports Mr Joe Aggrey who did the presentation of the awards said the ministry will not only appreciate such initiatives by the private sector but will equally support it and hope it will be a regular thing so as to promote the game of football on the continent and the players as well.

Mr Aggrey said he hoped Ghana will continue to feature on the award list and promised the ministry's commitment to support the FA's choice for a coach for the Black Stars.