Black Rockets, our hope for years to come

The failure to produce world champions, coupled with struggles of the national boxing team, the Black Bombers, have conspired to cast dark shadows over the progress of boxing in Ghana.

Since the loss of world titsles won by Richard Commey and Isaac Dogboe, the last set of world champions, Ghana has failed to get a boxer closer to that dream at the pay-per-punch level.

At the amateur level, the story has been gloomy for the Ghana Boxing Federation; failing to qualify boxers to major events, including the last Olympic Games.

These teething challenges must occupy the thoughts and minds of the administrators instead of the boardroom wrangling that has created chaotic scenes on the boxing space.

Clearly, some promotions staged recently were indicative of the fact that Ghana as a country has not lost it all. There are some boxers who are showing enough talents that needed the help of officialdom to make that giant leap to the international stage.

At the amateur level, the Black Bombers are not bereft of talent to take their rightful place in international boxing. What is missing are the regular competitions locally and the ability to partake in international competitions to stay alert and competitive.

The news of the Black Rockets- the younger version of the Black Bombers- to have shone at the just ended Africa Youth Boxing Championship in Guinea, therefore, comes as a gratifying news for lovers of the sport.

It is also a big feather in the cup of the GBF led by Mr Bernard Quartey under whose administration the feat was chalked.

The team, according to reports, put up a spirited performance at the 2025 Africa Youth Amateur Boxing Championship and capped it with three gold medals.

But for the Africa Games Accra 2023 success, this feat would have been the biggest in over decades.

The gold medals came from Desmond Pappoe, who knocked out South Africa’s Mighty Sangoni in the second round of the Men’s Middleweight (75kg) division, as well as Mathias Ashitey in the flyweight (51kg) category and George Dowouna in the bantamweight (54kg) division.

This win offers an assurance of Ghana’s ability in youth and amateur boxing, and the need to begin to raise new champions and potential world beaters through a systematic way of identifying talents for grooming.

Pappoe, Ashittey and Dowuona are young and upcoming brawlers at the youthful stages of the sport, getting guidance and tuition from another breed of upcoming coaches hungry for honours.

This is surely the way to go. It is important for the GBF to first of all identify such dedicated coaches whose focus must solely be on these youngsters.

Sometimes, the shift in concentration – as coaches manage both youngsters and professionals at the same time – bring a lot of distractions which in the end affects their upbringing.

These dedicated coaches must be trained and sponsored to participate in courses run by the International Boxing Association (IBA) to be certified.

After this, their core mandate should be a recruitment of young and talented boxers to join the Black Rockets.

The focus of this generation of boxers must be to participate in championships similar to the Africa Youth Championships or locally organised ones and finally aim to compete for spaces in the Black Bombers’ team.

For the feat, they deserve the commendation of all. Just as agencies of sports appear to have opened doors to welcome them and also share in the glory, it is a fervent hope and prayer that when the need for support arises for the Rockets to make similar trips, those doors would not be shut on them. Ayekoo to the Black Rockets.

 By Andrew Nortey