Augustine Ahinful tasks GFA to define Chris Hughton’s role
Former Black Stars striker, Augustine Ahinful, has called on the Ghana Football Association (GFA) to come clear on Chris Hughton’s role as a technical advisor to the interim Black Stars coach, Otto Addo.
Ahinful, who was capped 19 times at the senior national team level, told Graphic Sports that it would be in the interest of Ghanaians to know what went into the decision to appoint an interim coach and a technical advisor for the Stars’ upcoming 2022 FIFA World Cup playoff against Nigeria next month.
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“It is not clear and I don’t understand what went into that decision,” said Ahinful. If you have named an interim trainer for the match against Nigeria, why then do you add a technical advisor?
“What is his role and what is he going to do? All these things must be clear, otherwise it raises concerns as to the structure of the technical team,” he explained.
Coach Addo was named by the GFA as the man to lead the Stars in their two-leg encounter with Nigeria where the winner on aggregate qualifies to the Qatar 2022 FIFA World Cup in November.
The Borussia Dortmund trainer/scout will be assisted by Aston Villa’s U-23 coach, George Boateng, and Mas-Ud Didi Dramani, Technical Director of Right To Dream Academy, with British-born Ghanaian manager, Chris Hughton, serving as a Technical Advisor.
The former Borussia Dortmund forward also questioned why the GFA decided to hire coaches who were contracted to clubs for the crucial game against Nigeria.
Ahinful said it would have been better to make do with coaches who had time to monitor players before announcing the team for the Nigeria encounter.
“I am not saying the coaches who have been appointed are not capable, but they are all contracted to clubs so I doubt if they will have enough time to make the right decisions against Nigeria.
“This is very important because you need a coach to have enough time to monitor players before inviting them, but once they are already working with other clubs, how do they get the time to do that?” he asked.
