Two years ago, while working for Ghanasoccernet, I wrote an article entitled – ‘Ghana likely to extend 35 years AFCON trophy-less run for the next 10 years.’
Fast forward, the scenarios seem worse and I keep getting the conviction that Egypt is not the place. Perhaps, this is not the time.
Ghana may end the over three decades wait for the AFCON trophy but it doesn’t look like now. I’m not sounding too negative but I keep being convinced by recent happenings and the prevailing environment that, the search is not ending anytime soon.
When I look back at the article I wrote two years ago, I get overly optimistic that we have not done enough as a country to win the trophy, and if measures are not swiftly taken to end the wait and make the dream a reality, Ghana can go for the next decade without the trophy.
This may sound strange but that is surely what is likely to happen in the next five AFCONS and Ghana could extend their trophy-less run at the tournament to 45 years.
I am not sounding a prophet of doom but the strange happenings in the country, especially during the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations in Gabon creates the impression that the wait will not end now, at least not in the next ten years.
Many a time, pundits of the game claim football has the power to unify people, groups and a nation at large but this assertion has been defeated by the current wind blowing in Ghana and that gives me the impression that it will take much longer a time to get to the Promised Land.
The reason is simple; Party Politics.
Party politics have always divided Ghanaians but football has proved to be the unifying element. Unfortunately, politicians have succeeded in infesting that element of unity with their political chants breaking the country’s only component of togetherness.
And Nana Akufo-Addo’s present role in getting the Black Stars lift the AFCON trophy is enough a testimony.
A meeting with the President at the Flagstaff House was followed by a dinner at the Kempinski Hotel before the team left for Dubai for a three-week training tour.