Ghana Football Association Head of Public Relations and Strategy, Neil Armstrong Mortagbe, has shared his thoughts on the fallout from the Black Starlets failure to secure direct qualification to the Under 17 FIFA World Cup.
The world event is slated to take place in Qatar in November but Ghana would have to win its playoff tie against Uganda to secure qualification. (Scroll down to watch video)
This is down to the Black Starlets finishing third in Group D at the ongoing Under 17 AFCON after losing out on drawing lots with Algeria who progressed to the quarterfinals and qualified to the World Cup in the process.
Ghana and Algeria finished tied on points, goal difference and head to head leaving the countries to draw lots to break the tie. Ghana ended up picking the inferior lot to miss out on making the AFCON quarterfinals.
Addressing the issue, Armstrong Mortagbe said, “This-drawing lots- was known to all the participating nations before the tournament. If there is a tie, there is a way that the tie would be broken…and if it is that the competition rules we use the drawing of lots to break that kind of tie, we use that. It’s unfortunate that it had to be that.”
🎥🇬🇭 “It might be controversial, but that’s the way of separating teams. It doesn’t happen often but it can occur at the World Cup.”
GFA Head of PR and Strategy, Neil Armstrong-Mortagbe, on the drawing of lots that caused Black Starlets’ elimination at the #U17AFCON#CitiSports pic.twitter.com/R4kfpaLapB
— Citi Sports (@CitiSportsGHA) May 21, 2026
