Avram Grant: One year as Black Stars coach so far so good

Published on: 27 November 2015
Avram Grant: One year as  Black Stars coach so far so good
Avram Grant

How Avram Grant managed to blend attacking football with shrewd defense.

Ghana ‘”The Brazil of African Football”’ lost its identity having gone through the stewardship of back to back pragmatic Serbian Coaches (Milovan Rajevac and Goran Stevanovic).

The Black Stars renowned for their attacking style of play changed drastically into a boring side which scored one goal and defended with their lives under a collection of Serbian coaches.

This style made the Black Stars the best defensive side in Africa and one of the best in the world but it came with a price and that was, throwing away their attacking style.

It somehow produced results but fans and media alike criticized the team and cried for a return to our old style.

A Ghanaian coach James Akwesi Appiah took over from the ‘one goal project’ coaches in a bid to return the team to it traditional attacking style, It didn’t go well as the team started leaking in goals as evident in the 2013 AFCON where the team conceded six goals in six games , an average of a goal per game.

Even though the Stars scored ten in that same tournament the style of play wasn’t encouraging and was virtually unattractive and most worrying was that we were bossed by even minnows like Carpe Verde and Burkina Faso, that did little to suggest Kwesi Appiah had added a positive dimension to the team.

Kwesi Appiah made history by becoming the first Ghanaian coach to qualify the Stars to a world cup but his team conceded six in three world cup games in 2014 as compared four in five games in 2010 under the pragmatic Serbian.

The Situation got worse during the AFCON 2015 qualifiers where the team conceded three goals in two games under Akwesi Appiah, That infamous 1-1 draw game against Uganda was the final straw which broke the camel’s back.

Things didn’t improve with the team conceding in each of the remaining four games under care-taker coach Maxwell Konadu who is still the assistant coach of the team.

But exactly a year ago today former Chelsea manager Avram Grant was appointed the head coach of Ghana.

His appointment as expected was greeted with mixed reactions in a country of ‘22 million coaches’ with some questioning the timing of his appointment, others questioned his winning ability and ‘others ’ nodding their heads to the decision as their opinions could not change the decision to appoint him.

His immediate task was AFCON 2015 which was a month after his appointment. Ghana was placed in the group of death together with Senegal, Algeria and South Africa.

Grant’s first competitive game was nothing to write home about as the team was outplayed by Senegal in a 2-1 defeat.

There was an improvement in the team in the 2nd game but it took a dying minute strike from skipper Asamoah Gyan to win the game.

The all important make or break game to seal his fate was against a rejuvenated South African side which had reduced their previous opponents ito a Sunday league side with their Dutch Styled total football.

South Africa took an early but the Stars took the game to them, outplayed them and won by 2 – 1 with goals from John Boye and Andre Ayew. Since that win over South Africa Black Stars haven’t looked back again.

They went on to beat Guinea 3-0, followed it up to thrash host Equatorial Guinea by the same score line.

In both games the team gave fans a feel of the old Samba Style Brazil football, dominating the game from start to finish, scoring for fun and not conceding any goal.

The grande finale versus fellow giant Ivory Coast was approached with the same attacking intent as a star starred, Ivory Coast were outplayed in midfield, neutralized in attack and had to fall on their resolute defense for large spells of the game.

Unfortunately the Black Stars were stacked by either the ‘Avram Grant Demon’ or ‘Black Stars Demon’ losing yet another major final via penalty shout out.

Grant failed to win the cup but the team has seen a great improvement under him. Within a year in charge of the team he has been able to marry sweet passing and free flowing attacking football with a well organized back line.

Central to this has been the combination of Afriyie Acquah and Mubarak Wakaso.

The midfield pair has been able to shield the defense, at the same time keeping possession and help initiate attack.

He has been blessed with two lateral backs (Afful and Baba Rahman) who know when to defend and when to attack. Black Stars under Avram Grant have played 10 competitive games won 7, drew one and lost twice.

The team has conceded only 4 goals in competitive games under Grant. Three of the goals came in his his first three games and only one in the rest. In respect to attack, they've scored 20 goals. Grant’s style of play has made the team create many chances when playing on a good turf that average strikers like Kwesi Appiah are able to score goals when they get to play for the team.

At this pace only luck and a bad pitch stand between Avram Grant and glory at the next AFCON.

By Rahman Osman

Follow on twitter @iamrahmanosman

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