Juju in football: Augustine Arhinful narrates how juju couldn't save Soccer Missionaries from relegation

Former Black Stars striker, Augustine Arhinful, has narrated how juju-driven Soccer Missionaries were relegated from the Ghana Premier League in 1991/1992. Arhinful, who believes spirituality and football are unrelated, stated that during his time at Soccer Missionaries, the team used to visit the beach to perform rituals after a bad run of form. Speaking to Erasmus Kwaw on YouTube, Arhinful revealed that a man led the team to the beach and performed terrifying rituals, but the club, regardless, could not get out of their misery and got relegated. "(At) Soccer Missionaries, we played a very good first season because we were very young players. Then in the second year, we had issues and this guy was taking us to the beach to pray. He will strip himself naked, enter the sea, and you will see that the moment he enters the sea, the waves will be so huge and then he will come out with an egg. There's a river in Assin Fosu; our officials will go there and do things before we go and (play matches). We go and we lost. We go and we lost, we go and we lost; we went to relegation," he said. Arhinful asserted that his perception of juju helping the team to win games changed when he joined Goldfields (now AshantiGold SC) in the 1992/93 season. "I transitioned to Goldfields, David Boat was there. On a Saturday, a list of 18 players was placed on the notice board, because there were only 16 players who were supposed to dress...we were not even praying, but the team was winning. And I was like, this thing that we were doing in Takoradi that we were losing, we are not doing it here but we are winning. Why? Because David Boat knew what he wanted. He had picked(bought) all the players by himself." Augustine Arhinful is one of the highly-rated former Ghanaian footballers. He started his career in Ghana at Missionaries and Ashanti Gold before departing Ghana to continue his career abroad. In Europe, he played for Borussia Dortmund, Veneza and a host of Turkish clubs before retiring in 2008 due to a consistent knee problem. In his international career, he played for Ghana at the U-17 level, U-20 and with the Black Stars. Watch the interview below Watch this week's episode of GhanaWeb Sports Debate below: EE/BOG