2014 World Cup: Asamoah Gyan responds to Kevin-Prince Boateng's 'sack' comments

Former Ghanaian international footballer Asamoah Gyan has shed light on the ousting of Kevin-Prince Boateng from the Ghana national team during the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil.

Kevin-Prince Boateng, who had played a role in Ghana's 2010 World Cup campaign in South Africa, was recalled to the national team for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. However, his participation in the tournament took a turn during the group stage.

As Ghana prepared for their final group game against Portugal, reports emerged that Boateng had been kicked out of the team for disciplinary reasons.

In a recent interview making trends on X, Kevin Boateng disclosed that he had criticized team officials during a meeting over payment issues, which did not sit well with them. This he said, contributed to his exclusion from the team at the time.

Kevin Prince Boateng explained that a letter informing him of his expulsion was placed at the entrance to his room, and he was ordered to leave the team's hotel.

Boateng recounted the events, saying, "I spoke with the president about payments and organisations, I criticised them, we had a meeting and I criticised them.....they didn't like that and they kicked me out.

"They put a letter under my door. At 6 in the morning, the day we played with Portugal, they put a letter under my door, I took that letter, I just put it away and went to sleep. My phone starts ringing, from Germany, a friend of mine, a journalist, and he's like [yeah what's up, you got kicked out, no?] I said, what? He said [yeah, it's all over the news here, they called us] So I said give me one second, I picked up the letter and it says you are out. I called him back and said yeah, I'm kicked out."

He further explained that he was instructed to leave the hotel within 15 minutes and return all identification cards. This abrupt expulsion occurred on the day of the highly anticipated match against Portugal.

However, in a response tweet on social media platform X, Asamoah Gyan, who served as the captain of the Ghana national team during that tournament, provided additional context to the situation. Gyan revealed that the clash between Boateng and the coach, Kwesi Appiah, occurred on the training grounds and unfolded in front of the entire team.

Gyan clarified that it was the coach's decision to remove Boateng from the squad, as he felt Boateng had repeatedly disrespected him with his choice of words.

He also emphasized that the players had defended Boateng behind the scenes on previous occasions but acknowledged that, on that particular day, the coach had reached his breaking point.

“Kevin's case happened at the training grounds between him and the coach in front of everybody. That was the coach's decision cos the coach felt Kevin disrespected him several times with his choice of words.

“ One thing Kevin didn't know is we defended him behind the scenes several times. But on that day, the coach couldn't take it anymore and reacted. That was the first time I saw Kwesi Appiah get angry and react. So Kevin's case was the coach's call. That's the truth as the captain of the team”

Asamoah Gyan, ex-Ghana captain, rebuffs some of Kevin-Prince Boateng's claims about what led to the latter's sacking from the Ghana team at the 2014 World Cup.



In truth, Gyan led some players who went to beg Kwesi Appiah not to sack Kevin when the first incident happened. The… pic.twitter.com/lZVYf4LVNQ

— Ibrahim Sannie Daara (@SannieDaara) October 6, 2023