Defender Harrison Afful says Ghana will benefit from being considered underdogs in Group G for the 2014 FIFA World Cup finals which kick-starts on Thursday.

The Black Stars are in a taxing pool alongside USA, Germany and Portugal and the bookmakers believe they do not have a realistic chance of progressing to the knockout round.

But the Esperance player says that will play to their advantage.

“I think that we are all aware of the task ahead of us and we have been working hard to meet the expectations of Ghanaians,” he told Ghana’s leading football website, GHANASoccernet.com.

“I think we have a very solid group which will take a huge collective effort to get through, but the fact that many tip the German and the Portuguese ahead of us will play in our favor.

“We believe in ourselves and we are sure of making it through the group.” Ghana played two friendly games in preparations for the world cup in Brazil, losing 1-0 to Holland and thrashing South Korea 4-0.