SA forced to downgrade Ghana friendly

Published on: 03 January 2012

The status of Ghana's friendly match with South Africa has had to be reduced to a mere practice game following the decision of PSL clubs not to release their players for the encounter.

Thus, results of games between Bafana Bafana Ghana and Zambia after Thursday's international friendly with Equatorial Guinea will not be considered in the Fifa rankings since they are not regarded as an international friendlies.

"The first match against Equatorial Guinea is an official match. In so far as Zambia and Ghana games are concerned we have been in contact with our counterparts in both countries and the status of those matches is that they will not be official matches but rather practice matches," reveals Safa vice-president Chief Mwelo Nonkonyana.

"These two matches will be more about giving players an opportunity. We felt that under the circumstances we cannot have these games as official games because some of the players announced in our team will have to back to their overseas clubs after the match against Equatorial Guinea.

"However, we are pleased that teams outside the country have been willing to assist while our teams inside the country felt it is not the time for them to release the players for reasons that they have conveyed to us.

"And since we want to be polite and nice to everybody we can only assume that their reasons are really genuine and not in any way trying to undermine our national agenda," says Nonkonyana.

"Zambia and Ghana understand our situation which is why they have agreed for these matches to be practice matches which are not official games. Our CEO Dr. Robin Petersen has been in contact with both associations in that regard," he adds.

The Black Stars are billed to play Kaizeer Chiefs on January 12 before taking on Bafana Bafana three days later as they prepare to mount a serious challenge at the 2012 Africa Cup of Nations in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea.

Ghana is drawn in Group D alongside Botswana, Mali and Guinea and will play all of its group games in the Gabonese city of Franceville.

 

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