Sammy Osei Kufuor lauds players after Special Competition kick off

Ex-Ghana star Samuel Osei Kuffour says he is impressed with the performance of players who featured for their respective clubs over the weekend in the Special Competition.

According to the Normalisation Committee member who also doubles as the Chairman for the Special Competition, these players were very competitive in the games they played over the weekend despite not being inactive for the last nine months.

Domestic football was halted by the government after the premiere of the Number 12 documentary last year.

“I wasn’t disappointed with the performance of the players after day one of the NC Competition, because as a player if you stay out of active football for over six months it will take time to recover well and I think they did well”, he told Fox FM.

Issues of officiating came up after the match day one fixtures, especially in the Asante Kotoko and Aduana Stars game which generated a lot of controversy.

But according to the ex-Bayern Munich star, these are critical things to be looked at as the tournament progresses.

“For the referees performance I believe they are humans and can make mistakes, let us not focus much on criticism but on how we can make it better”

Meanwhile, President of the Normalisation Committee, Dr Kofi Amoah has also expressed his gratitude and appreciation to all the clubs after the GFA Special Cup kicked off over the weekend.

Speaking on the sidelines after Hearts versus Dreams FC game at the Accra Sports Stadium he said, “I thank all the clubs, their Chief Executives, the owners and the players for accepting the invitation of the Normalisation Committee to start playing football again”.

“I am excited to see the crowd but I wished there were more people here but this is the beginning”.

He also thanked the government for helping to revive football in the country. Government of Ghana has injected $1.2 million into the organisation of this Special Competition.

“We thank government for coming to the aid for the resurrection of Ghana football. We all know where we used to be before, we used to be on top of Africa and our target is to get there”.

He added that refereeing will be improved in this competition as the officials appointed have been trained by FIFA.

Two-clubs to emerge winners of the GFA Special Cup will get to represent Ghana in the CAF Champions League and Confederation Cup.