The Meteors were painfully unimpressive

Once again, the ship has sunk on its way to the Olympics – the Paris 2024 Olympics! It is the Mete­ors’ ship.

By the time the Games roar off, it would be 20 years since Ghana football made an appearance at the quadren­nial Olympics. This is utterly shameful and totally unaccept­able.

Last Friday, the nation’s Under-23 football team – Black Meteors, were bowled out of the Under-23 Africa Cup of Na­tions tournament after finish­ing third in Group A.

The mediocre-performing Ghanaians shared the spoils (1-1) with Guinea in the final group match to amass four points – an effort woefully sapless to power them through to the next stage.

Ghana needed to beat Guinea to secure a semi-fi­nal ticket – and thus qualify alongside Morocco who finished the group stage with a 100 per cent record – amassing nine points.

Though the Meteors, who beat Congo 3-2 in the open­er, and the Guineans were three points apiece heading into Saturday’s sub-standard nerve-jangling tie, the Ghana­ians were hugely handicapped in goals build-up – following their 5-1 thrashing by the Mo­roccans in their second group game.

What it means was that only victory could salvage the Meteors’ sinking ship.

Emmanuel ’99 Ideas’ Ye­boah’s first goal on the half-hour mark was a booster – and took the Ghanaians into a discomforting break.

The Guineans, however, fought back fiercely to draw level in the second half and managed to hold on for a draw that qualified them to the next stage.

It was very depressed, disconcerting to see another journey burst into smoke. What could be the cause this time around?

Many have propounded all kinds of theories and reasons for the slump.

The one that, however, caught many off-guard was that which came from the team’s coach – Ibrahim Tan­ko, who stated emphatically that the Meteors team lacked quality.

It was one of the most damningly startling statements to emerge from a coach of team, who was believed to have been given the free hand to select his players. If so, would he now own up to have done a terrible job as players he picked for the tournament were sub-standard? Were the players selected for him? If so, why did he not resign as he was being manipulated like a puppeteer on a string?

Indeed, it is incredible to see a coach pick up players for a tournament, prepares them and tells the whole world he would qualify the team with the same players – ahead of the Guinea game, only for him to make a sharp U-turn and describe his charges as lacking quality?

Now, could we take the outburst of former Black Stars midfielder – Derek Boateng as true? The enraged Boateng made an audacious claim that the “the FA owns a lot of play­ers in the national teams and that’s why we don’t perform.”

“When CK (referring to for­mer coach Akunnor) was there, the FA were telling him the kind of players he should call and when things didn’t go well they kicked him out.”

Well, the truth though is that a decent number of the Meteors appear to be trash – pure rubbish – and it was a painful penance watching them in action – especially the game against the host nation. Never seen any technically inept Ghanaian side like this team! Aside a few of the players, the entire team had no desire, no passion, less productive, uneventful and less creative! How do you concede eight goals in just three games? Certainly, we did not see Gha­na play – but a bunch players playing like drunken giants with mosquito limbs.

Again, truth be told, the nation’s football is speedily taking a nose-dive and the ear­liest we wake up to this hard reality, the better for us.

In the last 16 months or so alone, we have failed to qualify for the Under-17 and Under-20 AFCON – though we were defending champions in the latter.

We were also bundled out at the group stage during the AFCON 2021 tournament; we qualified for the Championship of African Nations (CHAN), but booted out in the group stages. Only last year, we were exited in the first round of the FIFA World Cup in Qatar!

Limpidly, there is something really wrong with our football – and it is no longer funny.

One of the main things that has to be tackled quickly is favouritism in selection. The self-interest appears to be taking centre stage. Players are no longer selected on mer­it – and in situations like that you do not expect any other result as seen in the Meteors – who became a laughing stock chiefly in their game against Morocco.

As we always say, let us go back to the drawing board – but this time around, be truthful to ourselves whether we really love Ghana football – or only interested in what goes into our pockets!

PlainTalk with John Vigah