Sports
Eyes on the relays
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France staged a historic and perhaps, the most exciting Olympic Games opening ceremony yesterday to kick start the Paris 2024 Games.
For the first time in the history of the Games, Paris staged an impressive opening ceremony outside a stadium.
When it was first announced, a few doubting ‘Thomases’ were alarmed over the arrangement put in place and others over security.
But pessimists were silenced with yesterday’s spectacular event that saw athletes parade in boats along the Seine River.
The ceremony marked a shift from the usual scenes of athletes marching around athletics tracks and dressed resplendently in attires designed in national colours with placards indicating names of their countries.
Yesterday’s invention gave participants and viewers a rare vibrant river parade that travelled through the heart of the French capital.
The river Seine replaced the traditional track with the iconic Paris landmarks creating a beautiful scene for the event.
The athletes were grouped with their national teams on the boats and ultimately arrived opposite to where official protocols were conducted, and the Olympic cauldron lit to open the 2024 Games officially.
In all, nearly 100 boats carried approximately 10,500 athletes.
As the various teams filed past, curiously, one could predict or imagine how the medal table may be like by August 11 when the Games end.
Team America was among the heavily represented sides in this edition with others including Great Britain, Australia, the Netherlands and others also parading very large contingents.
But there was also the group of countries whose numbers could compete for the smallest team prize tag at the Games, if there was one.
Ghana was in this particular group with nine members, yet poised to make an impact.
What that impact might be is what may keep Ghanaians glued to their television sets to watch which discipline and athlete would prove skeptics wrong.
Team Ghana is making appearances in athletics (men’s 100m, 200m, 4x100m), women’s high jump and swimming.
Athletes expected in action for Team Ghana comprises of Benjamin Azamati and Abdul- Rasheed Saminu (men’s 100m and men’s 4x100m), Rose Amoaniwaa Yeboah (women’s high jump), Harry Stacey (men’s 100m freestyle) and Joselle Mensah (women’s 50m freestyle).
Their times and records obviously do not present them as medal prospect, however the men’s 4x100m relay has shown much promise with their performance at the Africa Games where they lost narrowly in the finals of the 4x100m event to Nigeria in a photo finish.
The Nigerians ended on 38.41 seconds with Ghana crossing the tape on 38.43 seconds.
But they headed to Bahamas to book the Paris 2024 ticket with an improved time of 38.29 seconds to win the Olympic Qualifying Round 2 race.
That feat also recorded better individual times from each of the athletes that featured.
The height of Ghanaian optimism was the announcement of an automatic qualification to the semi-finals of the 4×100 metre race at the Games for being part of the 16 countries to have qualified from the World Relay Championship in Bahamas in May this year.
It gives the quartetsome vim ahead of the semifinal showdown, but must be aware of the nature of competition at that level.
With this background, Ghanaians have every reason to be optimistic about the chances of the relay quartet. At the semifinal stage, a little bit of hard work and concentration could ship the team to a dream final against the ‘best of the best’ relay teams, notably USA, Jamaica, Netherlands, Nigeria, Italy and a few that may be out to cause upsets.
It is a decent challenge they must embrace.
That, in no doubt should spur on other members of Team Ghana who are now considered as dark horses to make that expected impact.
By Andrew Nortey
If there is a club Kumasi Asante Kotoko would want to avoid, definitely it would be Kpando Heart of Lions, and not Hearts of Oak.
Kotoko and Hearts have sold to soccer fans some of the electrifying football atmosphere to underline their age-long rivalry.
Despite their stature in Ghana football, however, the lions from Kpando have been the most difficult and toughest opponents for the Porcupine Warriors.
Clashes between Kotoko and Hearts have produced mixed outcomes. It remains one of the few games which outcomes can be very challenging to predict.
But the story with Heart of Lions is straightforward. It hands them the dominance card over Kotoko; making them favourites most of the time when they are paired together.
Tomorrow at the Baba Yara Sports Stadium, the Porcupine Warriors would slug it out in their Matchday 2 encounter of the Ghana Premier League (GPL) with Heart of Lions.
Asante Kotoko and Heart of Lions have faced each other in 12 recorded official head-to-head matches, with Heart of Lions holding the upper hand.
They boast six wins, and two for Asante Kotoko, with the rest of the four ending in draws.
As recent as the last three years, Kotoko has been winless in their last six games, registering three draws with the Lions winning three.
This clearly suggests that the Porcupine Warriors would be engaged in another battle of their lives when they welcome Heart of Lions to the Baba Yara Stadium, a venue that has proven to be a comfortable hunting ground for the visitors.
Coming from a 1-1 draw against Debibi United on Matchday 1 and a Democracy Cup victory over Hearts of Oak, Kotoko must be ready to clip the claws of the deadly Lions if they hope to tame them to halt that trend.
The Bibiani Dun’s Park is also expected to be full of fireworks as GoldStars welcome Hearts of Oak.
It will be one that will draw the fans in the area as both sides prepare the game with different agenda. While Hearts emerged 4-0 conquerors of Berekum Chelsea in Accra, GoldStars suffered a 1-0 loss to Bechem United.
The quest to consolidate the week one gains or to bounce back from defeat would conspire to make the game a mouthwatering one.
Swedru All Blacks would also engage Debibi United at the Swedru Stadium while Berekum Chelsea lock horns with Dreams FC at the Golden City Park and Karela against Bechem United.
At the Aliu Mahama Stadium, Karela United will face Bechem United; Young Apostles versus Basake Holy Stars at the Wenchi Stadium while Aduana FC take on Sarmatex.
The round will commence today with a fierce tie between FC Ashantigold versus Vision FC.
By Andrew Nortey
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When the Greater Accra Region emerged winners of the 35th Inter-Regional Basic Schools Netball Competition at the University of Ghana, Legon, one name stood out above the celebrations: Miss Lilly Akutu Zotorvie, a young shooter from the rural community of Mangoase in the Ada West District.
The Junior High School student of Englishie-Kenya D/A Basic School was the tournament’s standout scorer, netting an astonishing 132 goals in five matches for Team Greater Accra.
That translates into an average of 26.4 goals per match, a remarkable scoring record that has attracted attention from spectators and netball enthusiasts at the competition.
For Miss Zotorvie, however, the impressive statistics tell only part of the story; behind the goals is the journey of a young girl from Mangoase, a community outside Ghana’s major sporting centres, whose talent was discovered at a local netball clinic and gradually nurtured into the regional school competition.
She was reportedly spotted by Mr Ebenezer Kisseh, a journalist and coach, who recognised her potential during a netball clinic.
What could have remained an ordinary community sporting activity instead became the beginning of a promising journey for the young player.
Her performance subsequently earned her an opportunity to compete in the Greater Accra Super Zonal Games, where she impressed enough to progress to the regional level.
At the 35th Inter-Regional Basic Schools Netball Competition, she converted that opportunity into an outstanding individual performance, combining precision, consistency and confidence in front of the post.
Her exploits have also brought renewed attention to the pool of sporting talent that exists in communities far from Ghana’s traditional sporting centres.
For a young player from Mangoase, the progression from a local netball clinic to representing Greater Accra at an inter-regional competition demonstrates the importance of early talent identification and sustained opportunities for development.
Miss Zutorvie’s emergence also presents a reminder that some of Ghana’s promising sporting talents might be found in schools and communities where access to structured training and competitive opportunities remains limited.
Now, after scoring 132 goals in five matches and helping Greater Accra claim the inter-regional title, the young shooter has given coaches, sports administrators and talent scouts another reason to look beyond the country’s major sporting centres.
As Greater Accra celebrates its victory, her performance is likely to remain one of the most memorable individual highlights of the competition – and perhaps the beginning of a much bigger sporting journey for the Ada youngster. -GNA
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