Soccer News of Monday, 6 June 2005

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Ghana-Burkina: Post-match Comments

Ransford Antwi (SpaceFm, Sunyani): The revelation of the match was undoubtedly JoeTex Frimpong. His second half appearance did the trick for Ghana. Issa Ahmed of Kotoko - who came to replace disappointing Kofi Amponsah - and Hamza won the match for us. Hamza?s appearance ensured that Appiah moved forward and this helped.

Some of the professionals were disappointing to say the least. However, I was impressed with the work-rate of Abubakari Yakubu of Ajax fame, Appiah, John Mensah. Team performance was not very good, but glimpses of individual brilliance.

I also think the locals made a strong case for themselves, and need to be given the chance to play. The Coach also needs our support as he strives to instil discipline in the team

Lastly, the Sponsors,Goldfiels were marvelous yesterday, taking sponsorship to another level in Ghana. Free T-Shirts for fans, massive mobilisation of support for the team

Ratomir Dujkovic (Coach): ?It was a very tough match and we struggled very much, but we finally won. I think it was a deserved victory because we fought from the beginning till the end.?

?The victory means we are still on the road to Germany and I?m very happy like any other Ghanaian.? The Serbian added.

?At a point in the game I was afraid we might not get back into the game because of the nature of the pitch and our players were playing poorly in the first half. They Buriknabes were tall and all we kept doing was playing the high ball, which was not working, for us. We discussed this at halftime and we have the result to show for it. ?

Stephen Appiah (Captain): ?I feel extremely happy because today we had a good victory. I don?t have much to say but I?m very happy. We were down 1-0 but we didn?t give up and we possibly couldn?t disappoint the fans inside the stadium and those watching on television.?

?Now the most important thing for us to do is take it a match at a time. We have our task clearly spelt out for us at the moment. South Africa-Ghana is going to be the decider. We have to win over there to ensure our place in Germany.?

Yaw Osafo-Marfo (Education and Sports Minister): ?What is important in football is the end result and our team performance showed clearly that we have a good coach. The midfield wasn?t strong in the first half, but the game changed in the second half in our favor.?

?Therefore I feel very confident about our team and I believe that our clarion that we?ll win all our twelve matches will be done. Now we have won the first one, we are left with three we have to finish the business so we get to Germany next year.?

Fred Pappoe (Management member of the GFA) ?This is pure relief. It was seventy minutes of pure hell. You couldn?t begin to imagine what we (FA members) were going through. At the end of the day, our boys were resilient and now we can afford to smile.?

?After watching the game between South African and Cape Verde it struck me that it could happen to us. So I was surprised when we begun struggling and I was just thinking that the boys should maintain their calm and persevere to the end which they did.?