Sports
Grace Adjoa Bayor: From scoring goals to dressing Ghana’s Black Queens
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At the heart of the Ghana squad that competed in the just ended TotalEnergies Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) 2024 in Morocco is the understanding that the current generation stands on the shoulders of giants.
The Ghanaians are one of the most recognisable nations at the helm of African Football.
As far back as the 1990s, Ghana was vying for a place on the global stage when FIFA introduced the Women’s World Cup. A generation of strong-willed women across Ghana came together to wear the famous red, yellow and green and start the chronicles of the Black Queens.
Memories from the 90s
This section of history cannot be written without documenting the tale of one of Ghana’s finest footballers to ever wear national colours – Grace Adjoa Bayor. A name that exudes excellence, longevity and overall success in Ghana, Africa and across the world.
“When I was younger, I used to play football with men and then someone saw me and encouraged me to join Ghana Telecom. This was in 1990,” Adjoa reminscences in an exclusive interview with CAFOnline. “At Ghana Telecom, we enjoyed playing small-sided games from around 1pm in the afternoon at the iconic Mamprobi Indafa Park at Mamprobi, Accra.
This was together with some eventual Ghanaian greats in the skin of Genevieve Clottey, Lydia Ankrah and Sheilla Okine. “These games helped to improve our skills. This organized football surprised me in a good way and excited me. Honestly, I was happy to be playing football. I was very small, very little. I was around 11 years at the time.”
Bayor’s quick growth ensured that she competed in the inter-regional gala competition whilst featuring for Greater Accra. This was organized by the Ghana Football Association and it involved teams from across the country like Kumasi in the Ashanti Region, Takoradi to mention but a few. It is from this competition that the first Black Queens side was formed.
Of WAFCON and World Cup feats
Bayor was on the first ever Ghana squad that featured at the first edition of the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) in 1998 hosted in Nigeria.
Ghana opened their WAFCON book with a 4-0 victory over South Africa and went on to reach the final losing to Nigeria 0-2. Bayor remembers coming off the bench to score for the Black Queens at the continental competition that brought together Africa’s top eight teams.
The tournament was also a qualifier for the now iconic FIFA Women’s World Cup 1999 in the USA. The Black Queens came up against Australia, China and Sweden in Group D.
“I was happy to be there, especially with that group of players. Singing the national anthem at the world stage was fulfilling considering where we come from and how far we had come to get to that level,” she reminisced.
Playing at the World Cup in 1999 opened up opportunities for Bayor and her teammates. She went on to play in North Virginia, Rochester, Germany, China while continuing to shine in national team colours. Her exploits saw her named as the African Player of the Year in 2003 and was in contention for the 2004 and 2006 awards.
At the 2007 World Cup, she captained Ghana and wearing the armband meant everything to her, her family, friends and the entire country. It was a display of confidence in her abilities on and off the pitch. For the young girl who grew up in Accra, it was a wild dream come true.
Decades later
Bayor retired from playing the beautiful game in 2011 but has remained at the core of the Black Queens – this time behind the scenes and as an Equipment Manager. Her role entails making sure that the team has everything that they need from an equipment point of view.
“I make sure that everything from official match jerseys, training kits, cones…everything is ready and good to go at training as well as on match day. Planning is very important in this kind of job and there is no room for error whatsoever,” Bayor told CAFOnline.
On training days, Bayor is seen setting up the necessary equipment onto the field of play exquisitely with grace – like her name. She lets her work speak for itself – a woman of very few words. Those who know her, know that her shy personality transforms into a commitment to deliver whenever she gets the call up to be part of the national team.
She locks in, gets her checklist going and ensures that there is nothing that has been forgotten. In fact, within the Black Queens setup, there are heavy fines for anyone that forgets something or comes late for that matter.
Black Queens now
For Bayor who has been part of the team for decades, donning the national team colours at the just ended TotalEnergies Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) 2024 is an absolute honour – yet again even though in a different role.
She reflects on the journey to this tournament and current generation; “We opened the way for them. We crawled so that they can run. They have everything that they need to perform at this level. The WAFCON has grown in leaps and bounds from what it was in 1998 on and off the pitch. It has been incredible to experience the growth.”
“There is a big difference from an organization point of view as well as financing. The prize money is now up to $1m. That is massive from CAF,” Bayor added with a smile.
Ghana was in Group C with the reigning champions South Africa whom they lost to 0-2 in their opening fixture, Mali and Tanzania.
Students and management staff were joined by keep fit enthusiasts to partake in the 2026 edition of the Street Academy annual health walk held last Saturday.
It was held on the theme: “Feet on the Street, Hope in Motion.”
The event also brought opinion leaders from some of the Ga communities, sports men and women including former world boxing champion, Joseph Agbeko, and children from the academy and neighbouring communities.
The event was originally slated for July 18 but postponed due to President John Dramani Mahama’s declaration of July 17-18 as National Clean-up Day.
That development did not affect the event in any way as participants, mostly cladded in yellow outfits, turned up in their numbers.
Spurred on by brass band music, the walk went through some of the principal streets of the capital, drawing more crowds from the communities it went through before returning to the Accra Arts Centre, the starting point.
Participants then went through another exhaustive aerobic session before they were refreshed.
Addressing the participants, Dr Ataa Lartey, the Founder and Executive Director of the Academy, commended them for turning out in their numbers for the walk, which he described as an event to enable the children and other guests to exercise.
Secondly, the event, he stated, was also to raise awareness about the plight of needy and underprivileged children, promote healthy living, and advocate the importance of basic education.
By Spectator Sports Reporter
Usually, when a coach is tasked to build a formidable national team for a major tournament, he does so with the best players available to him, with a special focus on local talents.
But where such local talents are not available or are unconvincing, the coach is allowed to supplement with foreign based players.
In this case, these players scouted beyond the borders of the country must be in top form and prove beyond reasonable doubt that they are far better than the locals.
Again, such players must also show some commitment and dedication to the national call.
A coach can however, decide to ignore this system in cases where there is insufficient time for the exercise, when there is a policy that forbids him from inviting certain crop of players, or if he finds himself in a position where he has no say on the players selected for him to use.
Recently, Coach Maxwell Konadu was tasked to build a Black Satellites team for the ongoing WAFU B U-20 championship in Cote d’Ivoire, a tournament which also serves as a qualifier for the 2027 Africa U-20 Championship which Ghana is hosting.
With that status, the Black Satellites become automatic candidates and rightfully, the focus should have been on a team to be groomed for the ultimate.
The sub-regional tournament did not actually oblige Konadu to rely on foreign based players, most of who are on pre-season assignments with their respective clubs.
Also, Konadu was under no misperception about quotas to allot local or foreign based players. It was very clear that the tourney was for the locals.
With this background, he is believed to have selected the players that formed the team that represented Ghana at the championship.
Sadly, Konadu and his boys disappointed woefully at the championship, failing to march his words against performance on the field.
Exiting just after the group stage came with little surprise. That has been the pattern for the national juvenile teams in their respective championships for now.
What left tongues wagging, however, was Konadu’s claim that lessons from the championship would help build a “stronger and more competitive squad for next year’s TotalEnergies CAF U-20 Africa Cup of Nations.”
The confusion lied in his admission that “the squad which competed in Côte d’Ivoire is unlikely to be the same one that represents Ghana at the 2027 TotalEnergies CAF U-20 Africa Cup of Nations.”
It would have made a lot of sense to rather build a team that uses the WAFU B Championships as a platform to prepare for the main championship next year, than selecting a team that in his own words is unlikely to compete.
This is a very common feature in other jurisdictions. The English FA, for instance, would have used an Under-18 team for the WAFU B, knowing the impact that experience would have on the team.
So clearly, the experience and lessons Konadu spoke about would be non-existent and would not help the team in anyway because if he happened to be in charge of the Ghana 2027 championship team, he would be supervising an entirely new team.
From where I sit, Konadu and whoever played any role in assembling this team got everything wrong and must be reminded that there would be no assurances that the next team would excel in the championship.
By Andrew Nortey
