Ghana's English Football Pundit

It has been a year at least since I last posted here. Since then I have not been in Ghana and Switzerland does not throw up quite so many interesting stories. (Although I did see a fight last night between two disappointed Spanish fans!)

As it is world cup time I thought it appropriate to post one of my attempts to be a football pundit. I believe this was for the Manchester City vs Newcastle game a couple of seasons ago. How do I rate compared to Phil Neville!

A football blog (kind of!)

Many people in Ghana know me for my football analysis on various shows, but I hardly seem to get out there and write articles about sport. (there is just too much other fun stuff to write about, like getting threatened!) I try my best to get some of my footballing opinions out on twitter ( I have not got many followers, and don't feel comfortable begging for follower...afterall...i am not God...right?) You can follow me if you want though @yevucee) but on Saturday, the day of the Champions league final, MTN kindly f*cked up. This meant that I could not give my opinions, and not involve myself in any of the online banter for and against Chelsea!

So to make up for it, I will write my own football blog, but of course with a slight difference. I could give my full opinion on the game and say that Bayern Munich played better, but that after all the Chelsea have done in the previous rounds verses Napoli and Barcelona, that it was on the cards that they would win. Or I could say that Roberto Di Matteo deserves to take the job for next season (or get a huge huge bonus) for what he achieved this season, but this analysis has been written and said all over the world a thousand times.( My voice would be like a whisper in a mega phone factory) So I will simply write about my experience watching the game in Ghana.

For those of you that don't know, Chelsea are very well supported in Ghana, due to Essien, Drogba and a host of other African stars at the club. This season, until the FA cup final, the Chelsea fans here have been rather subdued. (it is likely some of them have tried to switch allegiance) In the space of two weeks they are back, and almost back to being as obnoxious as the Manchester United fans here.

With my father as a Chelsea fan and due to our rather competitive relationship, I have never been the biggest fan of them. (I am a Gooner!) I went in search of a place to watch the game as a total neutral. My main interest was to see another exciting game to end of a fantastic season. The first place I went had the game on, but no sound. I endured watching the waiter try and try and try to fiddle with the cables in order to bring the sound. It became obvious very swiftly that this fiddling was certainly not doing any good. So as soon as half time came I ran to find another spot, with sound. I found one, and took a seat, which I realised may belong to one of the football fans arguing outside. I was fully prepared to move when the guy came back, but when he did he just stood there and complained to the guy behind me that I was in his chair. I got up and explained to him that he only need to be polite, which caused an almost argument, so I backed down and got on with watching the game. (from a standing position, but with my beer!)

The first thing I noticed, was the guy in the Arsenal shirt. He was shouting about something. I quickly tuned into him to see what the discussion was about.  He was bragging about how Robin Van Persie was the top scorer in the premier league. Now, I am an Arsenal fan, as I mentioned, and I am fairly satisfied with the season, but I am certainly not going to brag about a guy that could be leaving the club at any moment. Also, I am certainly not going to brag in front of the fans from a club that have lifted the FA cup and are in the Champions League final. (Even if they were utter shite in the league!) The arguments fans have here are amazing! They will argue for their team even if they are completely and utterly wrong. I am sure that if there actually happened to be a Bolton fan here, they would still argue that Bolton was better than Manchester United because one of their players miraculously survived a life threatening condition! (Jokes aside, Muamba has given us all an amazing lesson that we all need to check out health regularly)

I then zoned out of this argument, and settled down to enjoy the commentary, that I had missed in the first half. Then we got to the point where Chelsea equalised to push the game towards extra time. I had, until this moment, been rather enjoying the game. Three seconds before the Chelsea equaliser, this young guy in the front stood up and shouted "goooaalllllll yeeeahhhhhhhhhhhooooooooooooo". I was thinking that the guy was a lunatic. Usually, as a cross goes in, or if the ball gets slightly close to the goal, someone will shout "Goal" but this was really taking the piss! Then Three seconds later it dawned on me! This guy has been listening to the coverage on the radio! He new what was going to happen before the rest of us! This was going to completely spoil the excitement of the Champions League final., especially when it came to the penalty shoot out.

Penalty shoot outs are certainly a cruel necessity at the end of such a big occasion. Regardless of how cruel they are, they are terrible exciting to watch. Seeing who will mess up, and the agony on everyones faces is brilliant. The excitement is fully and completely ruined with a guy at the front, cheering when Chelsea Score and when Bayern Miss. He then seemed to look proud that he knew before everyone else. Because of this guy, I had to do the unthinkable, I had to choose a German side as the team I wanted to win. I had to do this, because if Bayern Munich scored, we was not going to announce it by screaming and shouting and then it would genuinely be a surprise!

Anyway, the game finished, Chelsea won (surprisingly) and everyone wen wild. (Apart from the Arsenal fan) I did not go wild because the above guy had pissed me off. I remained calm to such an extent that a group of English guys (who were United fans) thought that I was German! After watching the champagne get popped, and grown men using there phones to film the big screen, I decided to move on to meet some friends. (or try and meet some friends as I could not call anyone because MTN is useless!)

Walking out I had to watch my step as mopeds and cars were speeding around with their Chelsea flags as if Ghana had just won the world cup! I was then reminded of another reason why I was a little downhearted whilst watching the game. As I walked along I passed a guy who asked "why? you were not analysing tonight?" It is nice to be recognised, but I really wanted to work on the Champions league final show. I will never be able to play it, so to play a role on a live TV show. Maybe, next year, I can finally get on the final show!

The rest of the night was very non football related. Met up with some friends. Had a couple of beers. had a bit of a dance. Was threatened with a beating or a murder by Marvin the crack addict street boy. and then came home at 4 in the morning. Bulk standard night really!

Hearts vs Kotoko - For the atmosphere!

I have a pile up of things to write about the Hearts - Kotoko derby, the Joy Fm Night with the Stars event and by request from Lucky Heather my war with bracelet sellers on Oxford Street. I have been meaning to write for a couple of weeks but busyness and work issues and health issues keep delaying me. (Incidentally, the work issues may lead to a couple of interesting blogs eventually!)

This time round I think I will focus briefly on the Hearts- Kotoko derby at the Accra Stadium. On the morning of the game I was unsure whether I would go or not but having not been to this fixture before I decided I would be a fool to miss out another year! I called Michael (A Twi speaking German who is an unlikely Kotoko ultra) (yet to have a nickname!) and fortunately he had a spare ticket. We strolled down to the stadium met with Stephan (who's nickname will be revealed shortly) and his friend and looked for a safe way into the stadium. Having almost being the victim of robbery there before I am never to careful about getting into the stadium, but this time we managed to enter with no trouble at all. 

We got some relatively good seats behind one of the goals (which is not to bad because the pitch seems extremely small) and sat down with a mix of fans from either team. For those of you who do not live in Ghana or do not know about these two teams, they have the biggest traditional rivalry in Ghanaian local league football. Hearts of Oak are from Accra and Asante Kotoko are from Kumasi (the second city) They have long been the dominant forces in Ghanaian football and have only recently been challenged for the top of the table due to the large investment being made into the local league here. 

So we settle in to our seats, realising that there was no shade and that sunburn was an imminent problem ready for a good match. Michael, the Kotoko hooligan that he is, had inadvertently warn the colours of Hearts of Oak on his t-shirt. (either not the big fan that he suggests he is or hedging his bets incase of a Hearts victory) The atmosphere was great with most of the stadium full. The two sets of fans were singing there songs and one or two vuvuzellas were ringing out! We were a ready for the game. 

I would love to sit here and tell you all that the game was played with incredible quality but unfortunately that was not the case. To keep the sports journalism part down to a minimum, apart from a few glimpses of some skill from one or two of the players the spacial and tactical awareness of both teams was just not apparent. There was no diagonal runs in the attack, in fact hardly any movement into space at all. If there did happen to be movement the person on the ball seemed not to have the vision to anticipate it. The referee made a few blunders. He missed a couple of bad tackles and punished a couple of good tackles but not enough to suggest that he had been bribed (at least bribed enough) by either of the teams. 

The other on field mistake was by one of the referees assistants. He gave a corner kick when the ball was clearly not out of play. This led to some off pitch trouble when some of the fans from the upper stands started to launch a bottle attack on the linesmen who had to begin to dodge for his life! The police then jumped into action by standing and waving at the crowed! (I can now see why they earned there salary increase!) The Kotoko players also came over to the side of the pitch and begged and waved to the fans to stop bottle bombing the linesmen! The eventually stopped and the pitch was cleared and the game go back underway. (Bottle bombing happened at one more occasion in the second half of the game)

Other points of note in the game where the Kotoko mascot and the eating habits of a german football fan!

The Kotoko mascot is, in fact, a cow! I actually spent the better half of the first half watching this cow mince around the stadium trying to get the crowed singing and winding up the Hearts fans. (Quite amooooosing)(sorry that is terrible!) I don't think I can say much more about him (or her, maybe he/she had udders?)

Now on to Stephan's eating habits. Back home, it is not unusual to grab a beer before the game and a pie at half time! (a big manly meat pie to keep the energy levels up to shout abuse at the opposing fans and players and occasionally your own manager in the second half) Now, Stephan may, or may not be the typical football fan in Germany but it seems that his choice of half time food is...a cucumber! I of course asked "what the hell are you eating?" but he was able to justify his choice due to the high water content! (Fair enough, but he could just have had a bottle of water?)

Oh, by the way, the score is 0-0 and I lost my bet that there would be a penalty before the final whistle!

Kotoko Fan/Hearts Colours!

Cucumber and his Cucumber!