C.K. Gyamfi, Ghana's most successful coah in African Cup of Nations
As coach Milovan Rajevac’s contract with the Ghana Football Association (GFA) expires in August, Ghanaians are keeping their fingers crossed to see what step the GFA will take.
There has been a lot of talk concerning the future of coach Milo with divergent opinions expressed across the country. Whiles a section of Ghanaians are of the opinion that the time has come for us to believe in our own and entrust the senior national team to a Ghanaian or better still a ‘Black’, others are of the view that the current manager of the Black Stars has performed creditably well and should be maintained.
The latter’s argument is that consistency is very necessary for the progress of the Black Stars: they insist that the Serbian trainer should be maintained because he impressed in the just-ended World Cup in South Africa reaching the quarter final stage — the first of its kind in the country’s football history.
However, the fact still remains that coach Milo will certainly leave no matter how long it takes. This raises the big question of who will direct and manage affairs of the senior national team when the Serbian leaves. Who would handle the Black Stars if the GFA decides to appoint a Ghanaian coach?
Well, for personalities like George Weah, Marcel Desially and Honourable O. B. Amoah, it is time for African teams to appoint local coaches. They have made clear their preference for African sides to use their home-grown coaches since these coaches also perform when given the chance and the needed support.
This is true, especially in the case of the Black Stars, as previous local coaches have lifted trophies with the team. Ghana conquered Africa four times in 1963, 1965, 1978 and 1982. All these titles were won when local coaches were in the helm of affairs. Charles Gyamfi won three trophies with the Black Stars in 1963, 1965 and 1982, whiles Fred Osam Doudo won in 1978 when Ghana beat Uganda 2-0 in the finals to lift the trophy. Only recently did Hassan Shehata, coach of the Egyptian senior national team — the Pharoahs — equaled the record of Charles Gyamfi as the only coach to have won the trophy thrice.
Since 1982, the Black Stars have struggled to replicate the dominance they enjoyed in the 60s. The closest any foreign coach has come to winning the trophy was in 1992 and recently in Angola 2010 when led by Otto Pfister and Milovan Rajevac respectively. Our home-grown coaches have also made a mark with the junior teams and still fresh in our minds was the historic feat chalked by coach Sellas Tetteh (Borborvic) and his boys in the under-20 youth championship held in Egypt.
This team defied all odds to pick gold making it the first African side to have achieved such a feat. So, the records favour the local coaches. This has been the point of those who crave for local coaches and they believe the time has come for the continent to consider local coaches.
After impressing at the 2006 World Cup finals by leading Ghana to the knockout stages, the GFA expressed the desire to keeping coach Ratomir Dujkovic, but then he left the country after haven shored up his curriculum vitae with an impressive performance with the Black Stars at its maiden appearance in Germany in 2006. Thereafter Ratomir Dujkovic had a lot of offers leading him to manage the Chinese Olympic team.
Then came Claude Le Roy who was said to be familiar with the African terrain and promised to win the African trophy on home soil, but after failing to do so he also left hoping to land a better deal elsewhere. Coach Sellas Tetteh took the Black Stars through the first round of the 2010 World Cup/African Cup qualifiers. He was asked to manage the national U-20 side when Milovan Rajevac was appointed in 2008. Milo’s appointment was greeted with a lot of criticisms due to his poor English language skills and lack of national team experience.
A lot of questions were raised concerning Milo’s capabilities but he asked to be judged based on his results. Milovan Rajevac was a defender during his playing days. In 1979, he played for Red Star Belgrade in the UEFA Cup final. A team he acted as an assistant boss for only two matches though scoring a 100% record. His career as a coach saw him in countries like Sweden, Germany, China and Qatar. Well, for his two- year stay as coach of the Black Stars, ‘Milo’ has given his critics a lot to think about. Despite the huge outcry that greeted his appointment, Milovan has had a good run since becoming coach in 2008.
He reached the finals of the African Nations Championship (CHAN) hosted by Cote d’Ivoire in 2009. A tournament held for only local based players. Again, after about 18 years of Ghana’s absence in the finals of the African Cup of Nations, the Black Stars played in the finals of Angola 2010 with a very young squad missing some key members of the team. The team proved soccer pundits wrong who predicted that the best of the team would be a quarter final exist. Milovan topped this up with a wonderful performance at the just-ended South Africa 2010 World Cup which saw the Black Stars qualify to the quarter final stage making Ghana only the third African country to have reached this stage after Cameroun (1990) and Senegal (2002).
These achievements in just two years have made Milovan Rajevac the most successful boss in the country’s history. Live Score describes him as “A strict manager with the reputation as a fine tactician, he has made Ghana hard to beat and stopped the trend for conceding cheap goals”. So even after enhancing his profile internationally, Rajevac has expressed the desire to stay on as coach of the Black Stars despite alleged claims of interest from Qatar and his native country, Serbia. Do we then refuse to renew his contract because we think the time is due for a local coach? Despite being a foreign coach, Milo seems not to trail the path of previous foreign coaches.
My opinion
Yes, the records do favour our local coaches, but Milovan’s performance so far has been impressive. If he wishes to stay the GFA should renew his contract. Let’s maintain some consistency, especially now that the team is at its best. Should we do away with Milovan because we feel it’s time to appoint our own even when he is producing results? No, let’s allow Milo to continue with his work. However, I do think when Milo finally leaves probably after Brazil 2014, then a local coach should be given the chance.
ARTICLE BY: BARNABAS NYAABA, STUDENT, UNIVERSITY OF LEGON
