By George Osei

The national Under 17 boys? football team of Ghana, the Black Starlets on Thursday beat Impilo Ghana FC 4 ? 1 in a highly thrilling game played at the Ghanaman Soccer Center of Excellence at Prampram.

The Starlets who are preparing for the qualifiers for the African Juvenile Championships (AJC) to be held in Morocco in 2013, showed a lot of experience and composure to win this game after being given a scare by the Eastern regional 2nd division side who played a highly determined game.

Impilo Ghana FC started the game on a fast note and their hard work was rewarded in the 14th minute when enterprising Salim Mohammed fired a low grounder past the Starlets goalie after a promising move.

This increased the confidence of the team and they took control of the game for large periods of the first half, with the likes of Suraj Rayies, Rashid Farouc and Abdul Gido, showing a very high level of display.

However, their over confidence would later come to hunt them as the game progressed, after letting in some preventable goals.

The Starlets sensing danger, increased their tempo and in one of their raids into the area of the opposition, were awarded a penalty after a defender of the Impilo Ghana team, Tanko Mohammed, pulled down an attacker in the box after he had gone past him.

Kato Iddrisu stepped up to convert the kick to bring the Starlets on level pegging at the end of the first session.

The referee awarded the Starlets successive penalties in the second half and this broke the resilience of the Impilo Ghana FC team who despite the defeat, did put up a very good performance.

Emmanuel Boateng scored both penalties with Stephen Nyarko adding a fourth to complete the scoring for the Black Starlets who will play the Republic of Gambia in October over two legs as they begin the quest to qualify to the AJC next year.

The game also gave the handlers of the Impilo Ghana team a fair idea of their state of readiness for their league campaign which is expected to start soon in the Eastern region.

Source: George Osei (okotosports@yahoo.com)