Relationships between GFA and Kit Sponsor Sours

The relationship between Black Stars kit sponsor L-Sporto and the Ghana football Association is growing frosty by the day as a result of the American based sportswear maker’s inability to abide by the dictates of the contract.

L-Sporto and the GFA signed a kit sponsorship deal in September last year but L-Sporto has failed to deliver on the terms of the contract, a situation that is beginning to incense the football association. L-Sporto under the terms of the contract was to deliver 50% of the total sponsorship package within 120 days and pay the GFA some 37,000 dollars within 60 days of 3rd September when the contract was signed.

The FA says 150 after the contract was signed; it has not received anything from the sponsors. The FA maintains that an explanation from the legal advisor of L-Sporto, Ernest Thompson that the delay is due to an agreement the FA reached with the company to send the goods to Miami is untenable because that arrangement has been called off for some time now.

The FA does not understand the reasons for which L-Sporto has not paid the 37,000 dollars, which was to have been deposited in the FA’s account within 60 days of the contract agreement on 3rd September.

The FA has meanwhile put up an L-Sporto billboard on its premises declaring that the association is sponsored by L-Sporto and the apparel maker is also represented on its letterheads. But the FA cannot be spared blame for some non-compliance.

At the press conference out-dooring Burkhard Ziese, the new coach of the Black Stars, L-Sporto the sponsor of the national team was conspicuously absent while the banner of the conference sponsor Coca-Cola adorned the conference room.

L-Sporto was heavily criticized after it emerged in the weeks leading up to the interviewing of candidates for the Black Stars coaching job that the kit manufacturer had a candidate the FA was bent on employing. That man Manuel Gomes however lost out on the job after failing to impress the interviewing panel that selected the Black Stars coach