Ghanaians have expressed anger at the Ghana Black Stars team after they failed to reach the quarter finals of the 2019 AFCON tournament.
Ghana lost to their Tunisian counterparts in a 5-4 penalty shoot-out as Caleb Ekuban missed his penalty.
A lot of criticisms has been meted out to the entire team for their rather abysmal performance at the tournament.
Many had thrown their support behind the Black Stars team considering Ghana’s 37-year-old trophy drought.
It was however sad when Ghana had a rather poor performance at the tournament after winning only one match.
One person who was called out on the poor performance of the team was Black Stars Coach James Kwesi Appiah.
Even though there was a lot of criticism directed at the coach, some claimed that he should not be blamed.
1. Black Stars belittled Benin in their first game
The team’s spirit was dumped right from the first match when they drew 2-2 with their Benin counterparts in Group F.
Benin is known to be a weaker side compared to Ghana so the expectation for the team to win was high.
The team was said to belittle Benin because they allowed them to score first and later equalize when Ghana was in the lead.
2. Time for making changes keeps long
Coach Kwesi Appiah failed to make substitution on time when it was needed most of the time.
In a match where the plan was not working, he failed to make substitutions on time to change the formation that was not giving us goals.
Many a time, Kwesi Appiah made changes at the eleventh hour when the players are really worn out and the formation seem not working.
He seemed to have kept some players on the pitch at a time when everyone noticed that the player was tired.
3. Playing a lone striker was detrimental to the team’s scoring abilities
The idea of playing a defensive game than an offensive formation really caused the Black Stars a lot of harm.
Benin was not such a tough team so the decision to play Jordan Ayew as a lone striker was such a wrong move.
Same lone striker was used in the game against Cameroon and Tunisia when Jordan Ayew was made to play alone upfront.
With Tunisia who played draw in all their group stage matches, Ghana should have been more offensive against them.
The team needed to put two strikers upfront so as to increase the team’s chances of scoring goals.
4. Tunisia was not superb in their previous matches so Ghana should have won outright
The Black Stars should have won the match with Tunisia outright especially after they performed poorly in the first half.
Tunisia did not prove that they were tough enough in the previous games so packing three midfielders with just a lone striker was bad for our winning.
At a time when Kwesi Appiah needed to make changes so the team could play a more offensive game, he did not.
Jordan was made to suffer upfront when he should have had a helper to pair with which would have transformed into goals for the team.
5. Kwesi Appiah do not have a first eleven
Coach Kwesi Appiah did not seem to have a definite starting line-up in all the matches that were played.
In every match, he made changes to the starting line-up so it was evident that he was still applying a try and error tactic.
He also played different tactics in all the games which went the bad way for us since the players were made to play differently at every point in time.
With such a strong team, the coach should have had a starting eleven players so they play in a rather uniform and systematic manner.
In conclusion, it is evident that Coach Kwesi Appiah was not able to manage the team given to him appropriately.
Cameroon was the only tough team we met so it was surprising that the team won only one match until their exit.
