Sports
A call referees must heed to
It’s less than a week since the 2025 AFCON ended in Morocco.
For those that had the privilege to watch it via television, it may have gone into the competition’s annals as one of the best in terms of organisation.
But for the ‘yen bo biom’ (match abandonment) ‘excellently’ staged by the eventual winners, Senegal’s Terranga Lions, AFCON 2025 was beautifully staged and was incident free.
But in the social media age, it is extremely difficult to get every incident wrapped under a cover of darkness.
Videos showed a mix-up at the goal area of Senegal arising from a towel placed near the goal post by goalkeeper Mendy.
But almost a week after, two countries – eventual winners Senegal and Ghana, a non-participant, are still celebrating the gains from the championship.
Streets of Senegal have been filled with fans who wants to catch a glimpse of their heroes.
The victory marked the second time Senegal have been crowned AFCON champions, having won the competition for the first time in 2022.
Characteristic with teams’ success in Africa, they have been handsomely rewarded.
Senegal president, Bassirou Diomaye Faye, has announced that each member of the AFCON winning squad will be awarded a plot of land on the country’s coastline.
Additionally, each player will receive 75 million CFA francs ($134,000; £100,000).
In Ghana, FIFA Referee and Video Assistant Referee (VAR), Daniel Laryea, has become a cult hero with his encouraging performance, especially in the semifinal game between neighbours Nigeria and Morocco.
Last week, this column amply celebrated him and ordinarily, one would expect the focus to shift; and rightly so, the focus is actually not on him but referees of the Ghana Premier League (GPL) whose action, if not sanctioned, could ruin the gains and image credibility Laryea won for Ghana.
A number of clubs have been complaining recently about the state of officiating in the GPL as others threaten to boycott if the situation does not improve.
Kotoko was among the complainants after a decent goal in their game against Gold Stars was disallowed for a very funny reason.
An incident was also reported from Tema where a referee changed a decision to disallow a goal after watching a video of how the goal was scored on a Smart Phone of a fan.
Those reports, the success story of Daniel Laryea and a call by the Vice President of the Ghana Football Association, Mr Mark Addo on referees to aim higher has occasioned this opinion piece, to perhaps remind referees of their responsibilities in making the game attractive in Ghana and the duty of the FA to crack the whip on erring referees.
The FA Vice President, in presenting FIFA badges to 23 Ghanaian referees including Laryea for the 2026 football season, saying that, “I urge you (referees) to keep your heads high. There is a lot of expectation on you, and you must work hard to maintain the standards required”.
He continued: “Aspire for greatness and aim to become world-class referees. How you are perceived when your name comes up matters. Impartiality, fairness and top-class performance must always guide your work.”
In the face of what is happening, Addo’s call was appropriate and straight to the point.
Referees are vital cogs in the football ecosystem and their doing and undoing could make or unmake the efforts put in by a club. What can be more frustrating than a club scoring a genuine goal to be disallowed wrongly?
Many years ago when Asante Kotoko felt cheated and no one listen to them, they staged ‘ye bo biom’ which should not have a place in football. Senegal has just added an international dimension to it.
This is why the FA must sit up and check the names of referees which are becoming synonymous with undesirable officiating against some particular clubs.
By Andrew Nortey
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The national U-17 female team, the Black Maidens, have arrived in Rabat from their pre-camp base in Casablanca to begin their campaign at the 2026 FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup.
The team will open their Group C fixtures against Norway on Sunday, October 18, at the Mohammed VI Football Complex. They will then face Brazil on Thursday, October 22, before wrapping up the group stage against Canada on Saturday, October 24.
During their two-week training camp in Casablanca, the technical team tested the squad’s readiness with two international friendlies against China and Kenya.
The Black Maidens are returning to the global showpiece after missing the last edition, aiming to build on a proud record that includes a bronze medal in 2012 and three quarter-final appearances.
The team is expected to hold its first training session in Rabat on Wednesday as it puts finishing touches to preparations for the opener against Norway.
By Edem Mensah-Tsotorme
IN modern football, the final whistle doesn’t signal the end of the show; it signals the intermission.
The Top five European Leagues (Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A, and Ligue 1) have mastered a brutal truth of the digital age: you don’t just sell the match; you sell the marathon.
By weaponising transfer window tension, season reviews, and microscopic highlight reels, they’ve turned 90 minutes of sport into a 24/7/365 content vortex.
Meanwhile, back home, the Ghana Premier League (GPL) is haemorrhaging relevance not because the talent isn’t there but because the storytelling is dead.
The Football Association’s apathy is only rivalled by its hypocrisy.
The European Blueprint: Selling the ‘Appetite’
Why do fans tune into a random mid-table La Liga clash on a Friday night? Because they’ve been primed. Across the summer, broadcasters and clubs drip-feed ‘transfer sagas’ like high-stakes soap operas.
Will the star leave? Who is the mystery medical? This tension creates a parasocial investment that transcends the pitch.
Paired with this are season-review documentaries and hyper-curated game highlights tailored for TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube. These aren’t just goal clips; they are tactical breakdowns, sideline theatrics, and VAR controversies packaged into digestible and emotional bites.
This strategy has inflated broadcasting rights to astronomical sums (the Premier League’s recent domestic deal hit £6.7 billion).
They know that if you feed the audience year-round, they will binge-watch when it matters.
The GPL Vacuum: No Sponsor, No Story
Now, overlay this blueprint onto the Ghana Premier League. It is a stark, barren contrast.
The league is poorly run, lacking a headline sponsor to give it financial muscle or marketing prestige. Without that corporate backing, the media machine grinds to a halt.
The transfer market, which should be the peak of offseason intrigue, is a ghost town. We hear about signings, but the transfer fee is universally undisclosed.” We only get the contract length.
This kills the narrative. In Europe, a €100 million move generates weeks of debate; in Ghana, a move generates a one-line social media post, devoid of gravity. Fans cannot gauge ambition, nor can they measure a club’s financial muscle.
Most damningly, there are no reviews from the broadcasting rights holders. No glossy season-compilation DVDs. No weekly magazine shows dissecting past campaigns to build hype for the next.
The Broadcasting Right Holders (BRHs) treat the GPL as an obligation to air live, not as an IP to monetize through content. The league goes dormant the moment the trophy is lifted.
And the FA? They seem unconcerned. There is no strategic blue • A scene from the Ghana Premier League print to pump these ‘stuffs’ into the digital ecosystem. They treat the league’s media output like an afterthought, ignoring that a lack of online noise equals a lack of bums on seats.
The Black Stars Paradox: The Hypocrisy of Production
Here is the crushing irony that exposes the FA’s priorities. When the Black Stars assemble for a World Cup qualifier or an AFCON match, the narrative flips overnight.
Suddenly, the budget for proper camera operators and videographers appears from thin air. We get cinematic drone shots, multi-angle slow-motion replays, tunnel cams, and emotional post-match interviews.
Every moment, every tackle, every save, every passionate fan in the stands is captured in vivid, broadcast-ready quality. The national team gets the full ‘European treatment.’
This reveals a devastating double standard. The FA treats the Black Stars as the sole marketable asset, forgetting that the GPL is the engine room that produces these stars.
By diverting all production value to the national team while starving the domestic league of visual prestige, they are cannibalizing their own foundation.
The Verdict
You cannot build a football culture on national team fixtures alone.
Europe thrives because they understand that content is the currency of fandom.
Until the Ghana FA secures a headline sponsor, enforces transparent transfer disclosures (to fuel debate), and mandates that broadcasting partners produce engaging season reviews and highlight packages, the GPL will remain a hidden gem rather than a sparkling crown.
The players are there. The passion is there. But if the FA continues to save its best camera angles for the Black Stars while leaving the Premier League in the dark, they aren’t just failing the clubs; they are starving the very appetite they desperately need to feed
By Leslie Agyemang
