'Orphan National Teams'

The Black Maidens

You may be wondering about the title, but that is what currently reflects on the football circles in all our national teams. Most of our national teams are treated just as orphans. Much attention is paid to the Black Stars who until 1982 have brought us nothing than heart attacks and hypertension. This practice has sidelined the rest of our national teams in the corner and at times seen as ‘orphans’ in their ‘biological family”.

The senior national soccer team the Black Stars is believed to be the highest paid national team in the world. They received USD 15,000 as winning bonus when they thrashed their Egyptian counterparts nicknamed The Pharaohs during the first leg of the 2014 world cup play-offs in Kumasi. However, their “twin brothers”, the local Black Stars, were only given a token of USD 300 when they lost 0-1 to Libya in an international friendly just recently.

The Black Stars achievements can never be compared to junior teams such as the Black Starlets and the Black Satellites in the last two decades. But, it is the former who receives majority of financial backing from either the government or the Football Association (F.A).

Knowing that the junior teams always feed the senior team, there was the need for football officials to treat the former the same way the latter is enjoying. With regards to football where we claim is our passion, there are high levels of discrimination among our national teams which should be immediately looked at and address this unacceptable behavior aiming at changing this practice.

With regards to women’s football, the situation is even worse. Even though they performed poorly, the Black Queens were the first of our national senior teams to qualify for a world cup berth in 1999. If they had received the kind of support and sound financial backing their males counterparts received in their first appearance at the 2006 FIFA world cup in Germany, the Black Queens may had also gone far.

Aside this, the Black Maidens won bronze at the 2012 FIFA U-17 World Cup in Azerbaijan where they made their third successive appearance at the finals and the support they received after the tournament can never be matched to the Black Stars quarter-finals feet at the last FIFA world cup in South Africa.

The Black Starlets

The over-concentration on football in the country has resulted in the focus on a single national team leaving the rest to suffer. During black stars matches it is very difficult to even get a ticket as some people keep in possession many of them and at times sell it triple the price tag to others. Yet the stadium will be partially empty when any other national team is playing.  Such a manner of managing national teams is a total disrespect to others who feel the system has deserted them.

Even though the Black Stars have played their parts in putting Ghana’s image on the map of football during inter-continental soccer fiesta, they have in same way brought pains to many soccer loving fans and such pains will linger on for many years to come.  

It will be appropriate for the FA, The Sports Ministry, Government and all stakes in the football fraternity in the country to bring back the “orphans” home and treat them not separately from the Black Stars.