Former Black Stars captain, Stephen Appiah, is no stranger to sacrifice as a true leader both on and off the field, he has always gone above and beyond to ensure the success of the Ghanaian national team.
Appiah revealed one of the remarkable sacrifices he made for his beloved team and staff: purchasing Adidas clothing to create a sense of uniformity.
According to him, he bought the clothes because wearing their own clothes in camp wasn't nice and looking uniform projected a good image.
“You see, some sacrifices are worth it, but it has to come from your heart. We travelled with Asamoah Gyan to play a game against Congo and he charted the whole flight for us to come. It’s a sacrifice but it comes out of his will, nobody forced him to do that, nobody forced me to do that [fly home players and pay their bonuses] but I was looking at a bigger picture," he told JoySports’ Prime Take.
“We went to Slovenia where we were wearing our own attire in the hotel so I went to the to a shop, Mr [Kudjoe] Fianoo can testify, Alex Asante can testify. I went to the shopping mall to buy Adidas clothes for all the players and the staff in Slovenia so these are the things that are normal,"
“At the time, I was playing as a pro and you see as a pro, it’s a shame that you have made a name in Italy and then you will be with your national team and they are wearing their own clothes at the national team camp which didn’t look nice," he added.
“I was like we have to be in uniform because I had played for Udinese, I was playing for Parma and it was so nice so when we go to camp we are in uniform, everybody dressed the same, it looks nice so I decided to buy the clothes for us to look uniform and I didn’t do that because I wanted something, but if it looks bad I’ll be part of that image,"
“You see, we do certain things and then it will follow you I think when you do good, good follows you when you do bad, bad follows you,” he ended.