The Vice President of the Ghana Football Association (GFA), Mr Fred Pappoe, has stated that the GFA will take a second look at its programmes to ensure that more international matches are played at the Tamale Sports Stadium in the future.
He noted that the high sense of commitment and massive support exhibited by football fans in Tamale for the Black Stars in their international friendly against the Cranes of Uganda were “very impressive”.
Speaking in a post-match interview with newsmen, Mr Pappoe further explained that the high attendance recorded at the stadium demanded that Tamale was given the chance to host more international games.
“We would certainly look at our policy and see how best to fine tune it in order to ensure that Tamale hosts more of such games in the future”, he stressed.
Hundreds of sports enthusiasts from the Upper regions and the Metropolis trooped to the stadium hours before the match began in the evening. The stadium, with a seating capacity in excess of 20,000, was filled, with no seats available for prospective spectators, and by the time the match began scores of enthusiastic supporters were still found outside the gates of the stadium struggling to buy tickets to enter.
A combined team of the police and military had a herculean task controlling the crowd who were determined to catch a glimpse of the likes of Michael Essien, Stephen Appiah and Sulley Muntari who unfortunately were not able to make it due to various reasons.
The thunderous shouts and cheers in the stadium throughout the game were enough to tell the story about the enthusiasm displayed by the fans.
Indeed, the car park provided at the stadium was equally filled with vehicles, while the streets around the stadium were also filled with motorbikes and vehicles.
Three sports enthusiasts, Mohammed Mumin, Anas Adam and Ms Abdallah Mutiatu entreated sports authorities to ensure that more high level matches were played in Tamale.
“As you can see for yourself there was no seat for many residents who were prepared to watch the match, that should tell you that we are prepared to pay and watch such matches,” they pointed out.
When the match ended, hundreds of supporters still waited patiently within the periphery of the stadium and saw the Stars enter their bus and drive off to the GETFund Hotel where they lodged for the match. The Black Stars beat the Cranes by two goals to nil.
Touching on the match itself, Mr Pappoe who is also the Chairman of the Black Stars Management Committee, acknowledged that the Ugandans played a lot of possessive football and stated that “this is the kind of opposition we wanted to face to prepare us for the Ghana-Mali match”.
According to him, as a nation “we are going to fight the Malians tooth and nail because we would do everything possible to with the match”.
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