Players are also humans and can react to backlash - Agyemang-Badu

Ghanaian player, Emmanuel Agyemang-Badu

National football players are celebrated when their performance brings victory to their team and the country as a whole.

Supporters who hail you can sometimes write you down when you fail to deliver in a football match especially when the team is closely inline to grabbing a trophy - be it quarter-finals or semi-finals.

Ghanaian international player, Emmanuel Agyemang-Badu, has admonished fans to be circumspect in some of their comments and utterances towards players whose mistakes on the pitch might have caused the team to lose out from a big championship.

Speaking in an interview on Asaase Radio, monitored by GhanaWeb, he cited Asamoah Gyan’s famous penalty miss against Uruguay at the 2010 World Cup quarter-final stage as an example.

According to him, Gyan was “very hurt” by the turn of events in that particular match.

“He was hurt as well; he was very very hurt. You see, outside, people see things differently but he was very hurt especially what happened even in Zambia where he missed one penalty. I went to his room; there he was crying. That was the first time I saw Asamoah crying,” he revealed.

He condemned supporters who extend the backlash to families of the footballers. He believes that hate comments can take a toll on them.

“It’s all love when the supporters see things like this, they want more… you can criticize what they did on the pitch but, don’t involve the person's family because they are also human beings. Obviously, if emotions get high, they will also react,” he added.

Ghana’s former captain, Asamoah Gyan, on February 4, 2021, called out a local media station for bringing up the subject of his penalty miss after 10 years.

Gyan in a tweet indicated that "I have lost Respect for you guys. From today, @Joy997FM is out on my list. You should be ashamed of your selfyourself. Learn how to respect. Smh.”