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Soccer News of Monday, 2 July 2007

Source: The Enquirer

Osei Kofi slams GFA

Former national star, Rev. Osei Kofi has slammed the Ghana Football Association for the poor organization of the football league in the country, saying that current developments has rendered it uncompetitive hence allowing players to join the exodus bandwagon.

He said the downward trend of the league system has greatly affected the performance of the players making them incapable of forming the nucleus of the senior national team.

Rev. Osei Kofi who is also a former player of Kumasi Asante said that because the league is not competitive, most Ghanaians have resorted to watching European league games much to the detriment of the local league.

The former player who said this in an interview with The Enquirer during the launch of a book on the Black Stars added that the Local Organizing Committee (LOC) of the Ghana 2008 Nation's Cup must collaborate with the Ghana Football Association to equip the clubs in improving their performance.

"Currently if you look at the sort of investment the government has made into the building and rehabilitation of the four stadia for the Nations Cup next year, there is the huge expectation that things would change for the better, but if not, then the government would obviously lose a lot of money", Rev. Osei Kofi said.

He said one other issue that has contributed immensely to the low standard of the league is the bad nature of our pitches which he said does not help in unearthing great talents for the national team.

Rev. Osei Kofi stressed that even though Coach Claude Leroy promised to form a local Black Stars team, he has not been able to do so as a result of the non-competitiveness of our league system and the bad pitches.

"If the country had had a good and competitive league system all these years, I believe by now we would be able to form a local Black Stars team with the local players gaining easy access into the national team, rather than having to concentrate on the foreign-based players", he averred.