Did the Black Stars demonstrate the kind of hidden
depths that have been lacking under previous coaches when they saw off
the Amavubi in Kigali
One-nil wins—especially when produced by a Barcelona team stringing passes and knocking the ball about gracefully—can be a truly beautiful spectacle, but that was hardly the case when Ghana clashed with Rwanda at the latter's Stade Amahoro fortress on Saturday.
The affair between the pair was really a drab one that had the life in it painfully squeezed out by a considerably awful pitch. Ghana, a team capable of playing with a swagger on its day, were probably affected most, not so much the hosts who sought little more than maximum points against one of the continent's toughest sides.
Ghana struck first, though bluntly, when FC Kobenhavn defender Daniel Amartey—who was linked in the summer window with a late transfer to French giants Olympique Marseille—let fly a free header from a Mubarak Wakaso corner-kick early in the game. However, that, along with Christian Atsu's strike from outside the box and in-form Swansea forward (and deputizing skipper on the day) Andre Ayew's headed effort from another Wakaso delivery, were the only goalscoring attempts of note in the first half.
Rwanda, as toothless themselves as they had kept Ghana in the opening 45 minutes, almost got in front four minutes after recess (just about the very time Jimmy Gatete got that famous lone goal which secured defeat the last time Ghana were in Rwanda), but their penalty claim was denied by Somali referee Hagi Yabarow Wiish.
Atsu—in a performance that may fill Bournemouth boss Eddie Howe with hope on the forward's return to England next week—threatened again with an hour gone, but his low shot from an admittedly tight angle was kept out by goalkeeper Olivier Kwizera, before Jordan Ayew and substitute Solomon Asante took turns to blast wide, with the latter arguably the worse culprit.
Asante | A late miss looked to have ended Ghana's hopes of a win...until Wakaso struck
Minutes from the end, Rwanda's resistance was finally broken, when
fresh Las Palmas signing Wakaso—by far Ghana's most potent from
set-piece asset—wound one in from the edge of the area to give Ghana
their second win and eighth goal from two Afcon 2017 Group H qualifiers.The nature of the triumph highlighted an understated forte of a Stars team that, through injury, was shorn of its most obvious attacking option in captain Asamoah Gyan. Under head coach Avram Grant, Ghana have shown the kind of ruthless scoring ability that marked the tenure of former boss Kwesi Appiah. It is a potency that saw the Stars register successive 3-0 wins at this year's Nations Cup in Equatorial Guinea and which was also emphatically demonstrated in their opening qualification match for Gabon 2017, a 7-1 home thrashing of lowly Mauritius.
We’ve seen the swashbuckling style from Ghana before, under one Grant’s predecessors, Serbian Milan Rajevac, although the current crop have shown that they arguably have more substance about them.
The current Ghana set-up has shown it can still eke out the required results if, faced with some challenge like the one presented by the Amahoro's turf, the traditional 'agoro' mode were to be switched off; see the narrow, tournament-defining Afcon 2015 victories against Algeria and South Africa, as well as the 3-2 win notched in the pre-Rwanda friendly with Congo, as proof.
Wakaso | The former Celtic man demonstrated at the Afcon what a valuable player he can be for Ghana
Armed with tastes for aesthetics and efficiency alike—whichever the
circumstances permit for—Ghana's chameleon-like will to adapt is just
what, coupled with a deep pool of talent still very youthful and
brimming with potential, could help the west Africans dominate football
in these parts for years to come.During a weekend on which some of Africa's strongest failed to assert their might on the road (Tunisia and South Africa lost to Liberia and Mauritania respectively, while Nigeria could only draw away to Tanzania in Sunday Oliseh's first competitive game in charge), Ghana showed they can pull it off at home as well as away, and as much in style as through graft.
The display here wasn't by any stretch graceful, neither was the result too convincing. Still, untidy as it may have been, the job was done alright in the end.
And so Ghana march on to the remainder of the qualification process that doesn't resume till March next year (starting with another trip, this time to play Mozambique), and hopefully onward to that long-overdue fifth African title.
No comments:
Post a Comment