Black Satellites head coach Maxwell Konadu has praised the fighting spirit of his players after Ghana battled to a 1-1 draw against Burkina Faso despite playing most of the match with 10 men at the 2026 WAFU B U-20 Championship.
Ghana were dealt an early blow when defender Kofi Junior Kumah was sent off, forcing the Black Satellites to reorganise. However, Joseph Badu’s first-half equaliser ensured they claimed a valuable point in their second Group B match in Yamoussoukro, Côte d’Ivoire.
Despite missing out on victory, Konadu insisted his side deserved all three points.
“It was a very difficult match. We had a red card in the early minutes, which distracted us because we had to make changes and move players into unfamiliar positions.
But despite that, the game was keenly contested and I think we did our best. We played better and should have carried the day.”
The Ghana coach revealed the dismissal forced his technical team to abandon their original tactical plan.
“We needed to change the system, and that’s exactly what we did. We switched from a 4-3-3 to a 3-5-1, and that created a lot of scoring opportunities for us.”
Konadu believes the Black Satellites should have completed the comeback after levelling the score.
“Our strikers did everything possible and the midfielders worked extremely hard, but the second goal just wouldn’t come. We equalised when we were on top of the game, and that was the moment we should have killed the match. Unfortunately, we were unlucky.”
He also explained that Ghana’s attacking strategy remained effective despite the numerical disadvantage.
“The game plan was to use Kelvin to exploit the wide areas, with Latif and Amakye coming on to finish things off. The red card disrupted those plans, but we never gave up. When they came on, they created chances. The ball just refused to go into the net.”
Konadu reserved special praise for his players, applauding their resilience and determination throughout the encounter.
“I’m proud of the boys. Even though we couldn’t win, we’ll keep fighting. We’ll try to beat Togo and then see what happens in the Nigeria-Burkina Faso game. We believed we could beat Burkina Faso and we created so many chances. Sometimes that’s football – you just have to accept it and move on. The boys did so well, even with one man down.”
The former Asante Kotoko coach also acknowledged Burkina Faso’s quality but maintained Ghana controlled much of the contest.
“Burkina Faso are not a bad team. They won 3-1 in their first match, but today they couldn’t really come to the party. I thought we controlled most of the game.”
