FEATURE: Ghana’s failure in youth football: The growth we need

Some context:

There are numerous problems in Ghana’s football industry today. From lack of professionalism to administrative issues, to dire financial problems. These problems are affecting the performance of the football leagues and the national teams in international competitions. Ghana’s best performance from her youth national teams dates as far back as 2009 (i.e. Winning the U-20 World Cup in Egypt). Hence we have a lot of foundational work to do.

The neglect of grassroots football (commonly called colts football in Ghana) over the years has crippled the image of the Black Stars and the best clubs in Ghana’s premier league.

As it is impossible to ignore a flat tire, so it is impossible to ignore youth national teams. The words of the poetic piece above highlights the depth of this argument.

For my undergraduate thesis, I interacted with some football stakeholders. I collated data from retired coaches and players to grassroots coaches and players, to help investigate how youth football can be improved in Ghana.

This post will explore the problems from the perspective of the youth football players I interacted with.

Some of the main problems the colt team players battle with include; the worries and drawbacks of “football age”, the trade-off between schooling and a pro-career, and poor training infrastructure.

I gathered these problems from interacting with 10 players across 5 colts teams; Great Corinthians, F.C Glory, Hope Soccer Academy and Biribi (all colts teams in Accra).

• Football Age

I witnessed a conversation between a colts team player and a scouting manager from an academy, during an exhibition match earlier this year.

“How old are you?” the Scout asked. “I am 12” said the young boy. “Are you sure?” “I know your Headmaster, if I go to your school and they tell me something different I will sack you!”, the Scout said. The young boy afraid to lose his only shot said, “please I am 14.”

Lying about your age to benefit from opportunities is prevalent in many underdeveloped countries because of poor documentation and accountability. Too prevalent in Africa that, FIFA introduced MRI scans in 2009 to help identify which players were qualified to participate in the U-17 Africa Cup of Nations which took place in Tanzania.

In football, age is very important. Players who indulge in this fraudulent act do so to outperform younger opponents in age-restricted competitions, and help them attract club contracts.

According to one of the colts team coaches I interacted with, academy scouts and foreign club scouts are mostly looking for players between the ages of 8–15. Therefore, when the players are above 18, they become a “burden” to their coaches. A burden because such players are usually not attractive to scouts, hence they cannot be traded. The coaches then try to fix the players in local league teams in the lower divisions.

From the data I gathered, most players easily pass off as younger than their actual age because of imbalanced nutrition in their diets. Notwithstanding our poor culture of documentation.

This has cost some “right-aged” children the opportunity to be scouted even when they tick all the right boxes. Luckily, some players are registered with colts teams at the regional level, hence it is easy to refer to their records. That is a good step by the FA. Yet more work needs to be done.

With regards to the size of the pitch, ball size, number of field players, the distance between the goal posts, match duration and many other rules concerning the game, may differ from different age categories (i.e. U8’s, U10’s, U12’s, U13s, U16s U18s and Seniors (18+)).

For example, U7s in England do not have strict referees officiating their games, they do not have to face the disappointment of an offside or a poor goal kick from the goalie, they get 2 attempts to correct a foul-throw and more interestingly they play 5 a-side for 10 minutes a half with unlimited substitution of players. This sounds fun and structured right?! That is what organisation looks like.

In England, there are development matches and competitive matches. An U7s game falls under development matches. The focus is on learning basic skills in football such as passing in close spaces, decision-making, increased attentiveness and increased ball-time. The objective usually does not include “the number of goals scored”.

This ties in with the idea of some colts teams using one brick as a goal post with no goalie, or slippers/stones as a goal post with no goalies.

From what I observed during my research, this is mostly not the case in Ghana. A 12-year-old could be playing against an 8-year-old. In terms of physicality and skill they are most likely not on the same level and it makes evaluations biased and inefficient.

• The “inescapable” trade-off

If you are a Ghanaian and you want to make the most of your education and football talent, especially when you are not well connected or “lucky”, you will have to choose between the possibility of dedicating money and time to successfully secure a football career, or focus on schooling for a more certain future.

Considering the special attention young footballers require in developing the fundamental skills a footballer needs, Ghana’s current educational system is not supportive of youth football development.

Most students in Ghana spend 8–9 hours in school from Monday to Friday. Several students in the rural areas support their parents’ trades before and after school. Also, some students in the rural areas must travel long distances to attend school. Others face both problems and discouragement from their parents about their football dreams. Though parents are aware of the success stories of some football stars, they believe the chances are very rare.

Though most colts team coaches encourage their players to go to school, they hesitate to insist when the children’s parents cannot afford. Thanks to Free-SHS, the players can now afford to attend school. Nevertheless, in cases where the location of their schools is far from their training grounds, the players are unable to consistently attend training sessions.

Additionally, most parents in the informal sector would want their children to support them with house chores and their family trades after school. This makes it difficult for young talents to get the attention they deserve from their coaches. How then can we get the next Abedi Pele, Tony Yeboah or Asamoah Gyan?

But are the parents to be blamed?

Some of the players are made to believe that when they make it, education will not matter. Hence, most players quit school after Junior High School and train intensively with their coaches hoping to be scouted to Europe.

From the qualitative research I conducted, some grassroots coaches scout for players across Ghana and camp them away from the children’s parents. One of these teams is Great Corinthians at Abokobi. Some responsible coaches create partnerships with private schools to provide education to their players. Hence, they call themselves “mini academies”. When the players in these mini academies fail to be scouted in football trials or “exhibition matches”, the coaches feel indebted to the children’s parents. The coaches then try to fix the players in local league teams in the lower divisions. As we know, the local league clubs are not well-funded. This pushes most players to take up multiple jobs with the aim of earning a little above their cost of living.

One of the scandalous issues I discovered was that young players had to pay “a small fee” to be enrolled in some football academies in Ghana, after they displayed exceptional skills during their trials or exhibition matches.

From a personal experience in High School, during inter-school competitions, I had to miss classes while my colleagues studied ahead. This trade-off will continue to exist if the relevant stakeholders do not find a well-fortified bridge between education and football talent development.

• Poor Training Infrastructure:

In an interview with a retired goalkeeper of the Black Stars, he stated that, “investing heavily in the national teams has affected youth football in the country and the narrative has to be changed to improve football at the grassroots level”. I cannot argue with that.

With the increasing rate of developmental and real estate projects in our communities, the availability of pitches or unoccupied lands are very limited.

The needed infrastructure; quality football turf/fields, top-notch training facilities and stadiums that attract tourists.

It is difficult for colts teams to have access to these infrastructure especially when the local clubs cannot afford such “luxury”. Though some colts teams are funded by foreign scout teams, they still lack some basic but modern football training equipment and accessories like agility equipment, soccer tennis sets, rebounders, crowd barriers, pop up goals and the speed chute.

The amount of sprinting in the English Premier League has increased by 50% in the last 10 years. The matches are infused with high intensity sprinting and increased physicality. The new direction of elite football requires players to have stronger muscles and a higher recovery rate which makes them accelerate and decelerate quickly. This requires special training sessions to suit the individual differences of players. Hence the need for these “modernised” accessories to remain competitive on global grounds.

This is the core problem out of the 3 problems stated above, which limits the progress of Ghana’s youth football. In the interim, I think more investments should be made in the youth teams as compared to the senior national teams.

Some young talents are lucky to be scouted to European clubs through academies. The greater number who do not make the cut, should be most likely to get an opportunity to play in the youth national teams and consequently make up the senior national team. Unfortunately, these local players do not get access to premium training facilities for talent development. Making them unattractive to national team coaches.

Some of these players become a burden to society as most of them do not complete school, hence cannot get descent well-paid jobs. It contributes to a big vicious cycle.

It might sound cliché, but if the foundation is weak, the building can only go as high. Therefore, the Football Association and relevant parties need to seriously consider a talent development strategy, which incorporates honing football skills and providing quality education. This will benefit everyone. People may guess that we should adopt an academy system. Frankly, that is not far from the right path.

In subsequent posts, I will explore more problems grassroots teams face from the different perspective of football stakeholders in Ghana, and how I believe Ghana’s youth football can be elevated to everyone’s benefit.

By Nana Ama B. Ayenor