Yahoo – AFP,
Chris Stein, 11 July 2014
Accra (AFP) - On a field scattered with rubbish, ripe with the smell of urine and criss-crossed by commuters and the occasional truck, a group of Ghanaian footballers practise drills, the early morning sun glinting off their metal crutches.
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Amputee
footballers jostle for control of the ball during a practice match
on May 7 in
Accra (AFP Photo)
|
Accra (AFP) - On a field scattered with rubbish, ripe with the smell of urine and criss-crossed by commuters and the occasional truck, a group of Ghanaian footballers practise drills, the early morning sun glinting off their metal crutches.
While
footballers around the globe have their eyes on Brazil, Ghana's national
amputee football team is gearing up to compete in a world cup of its own in
Mexico later this year.
But
standing between the Black Challenge side and victory in the 2014 Amputee
Football World Cup are not just old foes such as Argentina and Liberia.
 |
An amputee
footballer kicks the ball
during a practice on May 10 in
Accra (AFP Photo/Chris
Stein)
|
That hasn't
stopped them preparing.
"We
don't have much time, so we have to train hard," said one of the team's
coaches, Benjamin Armah, as he watched his veteran players trickle in for an
early practice session on a warm May morning in the capital, Accra.
The Black
Challenge started officially in 2007 -- the same year the team won the first
Cup of African Nations for Amputee Football, said Theodore Viwotor,
administrative secretary for the Ghana Amputee Football Association.
The team
came in sixth in the 2012 World Cup held in Russia, after Argentina eliminated
the Ghanaians in the preliminary round.
In last
year's cup of nations in Nairobi, the team was placed third after being knocked
out by Liberia in the semi-finals.
Black
Challenge coaches will hold trials in Ghana's two largest cities in August,
choosing a squad from new recruits and returning team members for the
tournament in November.
Poles
apart
The rules
in amputee football are much the same as in regular soccer, albeit adapted to
take into account what the World Amputee Football Federation calls its
"abbreviated" players.
International
matches are played with seven on each side for two 25 minute periods, there is
no offside and kick-ins replace throw-ins.
On the
pitch, the movements stand out.
Outfield
players -- all of them missing either an entire single lower limb or part of
one -- dash across the field on metal crutches, using them for support as they
jostle for the ball and kick goals home.
People with
one missing or malformed arm are enlisted as goalkeepers.
While the
ranks of Angola and Sierra Leone's amputee football teams are made up of those
who lost limbs in brutal conflict, most of Ghana's players were victims of
accidents or illness.
"I
knew I could still play because I was already a footballer," said Mubarak
Ademu, a striker who lost his leg in a car accident when he was aged six.
The Black
Challenge's returning players say they are less worried about their fitness to
compete than they are about paying their way to the world cup.
The team's
practice pitch is a patch of dirt near Accra's shoreline that doubles as a car
park, a garbage dump and an open-air toilet for a nearby shantytown.
Just down
the street from the amputees' lot, Ghana's national football team, the Black
Stars, practise in a monolithic stadium.
The Black
Stars came home from Brazil early after failing to advance from the so-called
"Group of Death" in the qualifying round, which included Germany,
United States and Portugal.
The team's
performance was a disappointment to many Ghanaians, as was the drama that
occurred behind the scenes in the team's camp.
The players
demanded that $3 million (2.2 million euros) in appearance fees be flown to
them in Brazil on a charter flight in advance of what ended up being their
final game against Portugal.
This ultimatum grated on many in Ghana, which is fighting the fallout from a depreciating currency, a yawning deficit due to falling commodities prices such as gold, plus slower-than-expected growth in its nascent oil sector.
This ultimatum grated on many in Ghana, which is fighting the fallout from a depreciating currency, a yawning deficit due to falling commodities prices such as gold, plus slower-than-expected growth in its nascent oil sector.
 |
Ghana's
John Boye (C) reacts to scoring an own goal with Jonathan Mensah (R)
during the
match between Portugal and Ghana in Brasilia on June 26, 2014
(AFP
Photo/Gabriel Bouys)
|
"It's
at times very painful that virtually everything is pushed to the Black
Stars," Viwotor said. "Government should appreciate that every sport
that represents the nation should be given attention."
Money
troubles
Going to
Mexico will cost about $200,000, Viwotor said. So far, only $22,500 has been
raised, from private sponsors.
Without the
team, Viwotor wonders what would become of the club's players.
Local
governments in Ghana are required to give part of their budget to support
people with disabilities.
But the
bureaucracy required to access the money is daunting. At traffic lights in
Accra, legless men on skateboards appear at the windows of waiting drivers,
asking for spare change.
"Many
of these people would probably be beggars or have lost hope in life,"
Viwotor said. "When you watch a one-legged person playing, it gives a sort
of hope."
Days after
their early morning practice, the Black Challenge arrived at a sports complex
in an upscale suburb of Accra, where they split into two squads and played
against each other.
Players
with cerebral palsy joined in, showing little advantage over the
crutch-wielding footballers, despite having use of both of their legs.
Frank
Wilson, a non-disabled footballer who watched the Black Challenge play from the
side-lines, was impressed by the rigours of the adapted game.
"They
put in a lot of effort to play their game," he said.
 |
Hundreds of
Ghanaian football fans travelled to Brazil
to follow their team in the World
Cup
|
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