Ghana Football Association (GFA) Boss Kurt Okraku was clearly unhappy that the Black Meteors were embarrassed in Japan, but he feels it was a good test for the squad, which is still in its early stages of development.
The Japanese Olympic football squad defeated Ghana's U-23 squad 10-0 in two friendly games. The first match finished 6-0, and Japan won 4-0 three days later.
The GFA has come under criticism over the results of the games, but Okraku believes the squad will bounce back and fulfill its long-term goal of winning the African Games on home soil next year.
"Our intention is to build all our national teams at all times independent of competitions. In the time past, you only see an assembling of our national teams when fixtures are being drawn for competitions. So we had this invitation from Japan and our decision was to embark on the trip or not, knowing very well we don’t have a national team in place, ie the U23," he said.
“But we decided that it will also be part of the process of developing a team so the head coach and his team will want to take this opportunity to expose the players that they have to see which of them will be helpful to the cause. Don’t forget Ghana host the African Games, 18 months down the line and we have to win that competition so we decided to embark on it regardless of the results that may come out,"
“We played two games, it didn’t go very well by way of results but it has given all of us, the technical team included, an idea as to which of those persons in the squad we can take forward in our attempt to develop a national team that would be competitive enough for us. The end vision is to be competitive during the African Games and to ensure the trophy stays in Ghana,” Okraku said in an interview with TV3.