What looked to be a tensed build up to a crucial double header against Sudan in the 2025 AFCON qualifiers for Ghana’s Black Stars took a somewhat interesting turn with Ghana Football Association (GFA) President Kurt Okraku eating up all the attention following his viral rant at the players.
Many a football fan took turns breaking down the GFA President’s harsh toned words delivered at a team dinner in the lead up to the Sudan clash.
Many poked holes in the contrasting messages passed with every seeming line he spoke compared to what he had said multiple times in the past.
In one breath, he threatens to get them out of the Black Stars if they don’t show enough commitment and change their bad body language after saying several times that he isn’t involved in team selection.
To avoid clear conflict of interest issues, Kurt Okraku has stated that he isn’t involved with any football club since becoming President of the GFA many times before.
However, in the clip that had Inaki Williams, Antoine Semenyo and Ernest Nuamah give off some of the most funny awkward looks, Kurt Okraku stated that some players in the Niger team Ghana failed to beat wouldn’t even make the cut “in my club”.
GFA President, Kurt Okraku can’t come to terms with Black Stars’ 1-1 draw with Niger in their last international match, and expressed his frustration with the result when he addressed the players.
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— Citi Sports (@CitiSportsGHA) October 9, 2024
If this was a deliberate move to take away attention from the players who are clearly under stress to pick up points that gets Ghana to avoid missing out on an AFCON for the first time since 2004, then it worked because all Black Stars related talk in the lead up to Thursday’s game has been about Kurt Okraku’s rant and nothing else.
This is evident in news of Mohammed Kudus being named Black Stars captain still getting less mileage than it usually would considering the West Ham United midfielder is some ways off being named captain of Ghana’s National Men’s Football Team prior to the announcement.
In the absence of the “injured” Thomas Partey, many believed that Alexander Djiku or Jordan Ayew would be named captain of the team but Otto Addo delivered a curve ball by announcing that Kudus will captain the team for the first time.
This move has added another layer of intrigue to the game beyond Kurt Okraku’s best Alex Ferguson’s hair dryer impression considering the James Kwasi Appiah dynamic is also in play.
While some have reservations about the Kudus decision in the face of having guys like Djiku and Jordan Ayew around, this move is a master stroke by Otto Addo and here are reasons why it is so:
Being named captain forces Kudus to be more of a Team Player
The widespread sentiment about Kudus is that his wild talent gets him in trouble for playing for himself and not the team. It is the curse of the gifted as witnessed in the early days of wildly talented athletes like Lionel Messi at FC Barcelona and Michael Jordan at the Chicago Bulls. Apparently, what looked to be a Ghana Black Stars issue isn’t any more after West Ham manager Julen Lopetegui indicated that Kudus wasn’t a team player.
Captains on the other hand, are responsible for playing not just for themselves but for the team. By being named captain, Kudus will more than likely be “forced” to do this unlike before where just simply playing his game was enough.
This move mirrors that of Didier Deschamps’s decision to take the captain’s armband from Antoine Griezmann and hand it over to Kylian Mbappe. Even in the face of Antoine Griezmann publicly stating that the decision was “hard to stomach”. A few months after the 2024 Euros, he has announced his retirement from international football.
However, Deschamps knows that the best way to get Mbappe to be more a team player and most crucially sacrifice for the team by defending better, is to place that responsibility on him same way the great Phil Jackson got Michael Jordan to hunt less for opportunities to score but rather create more opportunities for his teammates to score more by touching the ball fewer times than he usually would.
Making Kudus captain gives him a big opportunity to get his teammates engaged more rather than make them disinterested and turned off.
Reels Kudus back into the fold after getting called out by Kurt Okraku
BACK TO KURT OKRAKU. The GFA President’s- flame thrower Malcolm X By Any Means Necessary level of a-speech had him call out Kudus where he all but indicated that Mo Kudus was playing for himself and not the shirt. Addressing the team’s best player in that tone in public can easily turn him off and distanced from the group.
On the other hand, by making him captain, Otto Addo has avoided such a situation from happening since giving Kudus such an honour reels him back into the group. Making Kudus captain when Djiku and Jordan Ayew are prime candidates for the task is a show of support from Otto Addo and a way of throwing his arm around his player and embracing him; top man managers do this all the time and it works.
As an aside, this move shows growth in Otto Ado’s man management skills as a coach which is a good thing for Ghana moving forward.
Kudus as captain shows the next chapter is near
Still on the theme of moving forward, by picking Mohammed Kudus as captain, Otto Addo is doubling down on his intentions to build a Black Stars team for the future as soon as possible. He has shown signs of this intent by his insistence on having Kumasi Asante Kotoko goalkeeper Frederick Asare stick with the team despite Asare being some significant ways off being the number one shot stopper for the Black Stars.
He has also demonstrated this by not including Dede Ayew in his squad despite the veteran forward’s fine form in his first dance with French Ligue 1 side Le Havre.
Naming Kudus Mohammed as captain shows Otto Addo’s level of trust in the West Ham player to lead the next generation of stars that has Ernest Nuamah, Abdul Fatawu Issahaku, Abdul Mumin, Ibrahim Osman and Ibrahim Sulemana in it.
As an honourable mention of a point, with Ghana needing to win at all cost in at least one of the two games against Sudan to stay in the hunt to qualify to the 2025 AFCON in Morocco, naming Mohammed Kudus could be a ploy for Kudus to tap further deep into the immense talent he has to save the Black Stars should the team need a miracle against Sudan by placing more responsibility on him.
Yes, it is surprising Mohammed Kudus will lead the Black Stars out against Sudan at the Accra Stadium in front of members of his fervent Nima fan base but every masterstroke has an element of surprise and the Black Stars are on the verge of witnessing one.
