Government to spend $5.6million on Black Stars’ 2022 World Cup qualifiers

It has emerged that the government will spend at least $5.6million on the Black Stars’ qualifying matches for the 2022 World Cup.

Sports Minister, Mustapha Ussif told CitiNews in an interview that each qualifying game will cost the country not less than $700,000.

“Out of the $25 million, if we have to play in the AFCON, we have to prepare. And we need to play two friendly games. And besides that, the world cup qualifiers that we have to play, we will not spend less than $700,000 on each match.

The Black Stars have been drawn in Group G of the penultimate qualifying round alongside South Africa, Zimbabwe and Ethiopia.

The team is expected to play six matches, three on the road and three in the country. If each game costs $700,000 then the six will equate to $4.2million.

If the team finishes top of the group, they will play another set of home and away games which per the minister’s figure will amount to $1.4million.

This means that if the country is to make the tournament in Qatar, an amount of $5.6million would be spent on just the qualifiers.

The Minister was clarifying the ‘$25million for Black Stars’ statement following the backlash from some Ghanaians.

Mustapha Ussif stated that it is important for the country to plan effectively for the tournament to avert a repetition of the 2014 World Cup disgrace.

“Then we are then going to participate in the AFCON and we have to play a series of matches, all the way to the final. So this is an expensive venture.

“We need to plan so we don’t have a repeat of what happened in Brazil when we don’t get money for the players, then they will refuse to pay and instead of focusing on delivery, everybody will now be on the minister,” he said.
The government has already dedicated $10 million to the Ministry and put together a four-member team headed by the Sports Minister to raise the remaining $15 million to make up the ministry’s required $25 million.