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Out & About with David Kyei:

13th August 2007

Correspondent: David Kyei,  Oseikrom

Sorry folks for my rather unorthodox introduction because despite the mild nature of my headline today, I am as a matter of fact not in a position for niceties this Godly day.

My worry has boiled up to the extent that I have decided to tread once again on a very dangerous ground, and like I said somewhere in one of my earlier right ups, I will prefer to put on my supporter cup these days than to remain quite and suffer over the correctable mistakes that tends to break the front of Kotoko and so open us up to evil and enemy attacks.

Whilst I pondered on the topic for today, something pricked me that I think is worth sharing whilst I also ask some questions that boggle my mind.

From the check on my calendar, the nation Ghana has less than five months for the to finish the preparation for the hosting of CAN2008, and yet there are not much around to convince me of our ability to host a competition which’s success could be measured by high patronage of the matches.

I am worried because with the few months left, nothing is happening around to motivate fans to start saving to be able to watch the matches they would like to be at the stadium to see.

Ghana in our slogan best have chosen a catchy and inspiring slogan for the competition, “Sharing Passions at the centre of the earth”.

The question I will like to ask is that, have we been able to locate the centre of the earth so that we develop something around there to serve as an attraction for people who would see a visit to such a place as a lifetime opportunity?

I hear the centre of the earth is somewhere of the coastline of Ghana and so will suggest that if it is really true, a travel by boat to such a point in the sea would be a desirable experience.

It will be an opportunity for people like me who have not ridden in a boat nor travel on the sea before to first achieve that and more importantly, visit the centre of the earth.

To provide the assurance of a secure travel to and from the centre of the earth, I suggest that the LOC should liaise with the Ghana Navy to run such travels.

The Navy can use that as an opportunity to demystify the wrong notions about their profession and only God know the number of people who will wish to join them from there on.

I have seen photographs of the Tamale stadium and my oh mine, that place is a state of the art architectural masterpiece that would be the place of choice of every excellent footballer.

I just hope the same or better ones would be built at all the centres that will host the group stages of the competition.

I also see the training grounds being constructed around in the host cities, but I will also like to bring to the attention of  the LOC that works at the Opoku Ware II School Park has come to a halt.

The fear that these works might affect the nature of the pitches before the start of the competition is also high so attention must be paid to it.

Not withstanding the beautiful edifices that are being built around for the competition, I am worried that there is no publicity on the coming events.

Some one told me the other time that Ghanaians, especially those living in Accra and Kumasi have been starved of watching high quality matches for a long time and so would throng the stadium in their numbers to watch the matches.

Though I agreed with the arguer on some points, there were more points of disagreement that makes shudder sometimes.

Besides points raised by my friend, I also added that most people would go there not only as football fans, but also as tourists who would like to see and feel at first hand, the construction works that were undertaken at the stadia.

This therefore will mean that the opening matches at the various venues will have high supporter attendance, but what about the subsequent matches? Will they get the kind of patronage they would be anticipating?

What is preventing the LOC to start publicity way ahead of the competition so that public awareness would be created for the good of the competition?

Those who have been staying up late to watch foreign TV channels, especially CNN will attest to how the organizers of Beijing 2009 have been bombarding viewers with adverts and documentaries on the Olympics, on China and more importantly on how they were going to roll out the red carpets to receive patrons of the competition.

Just last Tuesday, China launched their major countdown to the competition. The interesting thing about this launch is that, the day marked exactly one year (366 days) to go for the for the event and so for the period from now until the opening ceremony, many paraphernalia are being sold and also given out free of charge.

The bottom line of all these is to create the awareness for people to know that something is coming up that they should aspire to be part.

Ghana may not be endowed with the financial resources that China commands, but in our modesty, the organizers should do things around the little that we have to make the competition a success.

Before I hung up on this point of CAN2008, I will like to commend the LOC for activating their website, www.ghanacan2008.com .

Though they have put up time countdown on the site, I think the local impact would not be much for the reason that not many Ghanaians have access or make use of the internet.

The way out of this is for the LOC to buy airtime on both radio and TV and air programmes that will raise the appetites of Ghanaians to attend the events.

What is probably left to be done if for them to liaise with some of the popular email service providers like Google, yahoo and hotmail to mention but a few so that the competition website gets displayed at the home pages of these sites.

For best results and more patronage, it should be displayed at the log in windows of these sites. With that, more people would be drawn to the site. As for the benefits there off, it would be there for us all to see.

To my reason for choosing the topic for today, I have been heart broken with some information that came my way this week and I think it would be worth sharing with the people involved to enable them change for the better.

I happen to do some interviews with some of the injured players of Kotoko last Monday, and the information I hard from that interview to say the least was sorrowful.

Before people blindly start to read other meanings into the issue I intend to talk about, I will like to place on record that the players confirmed to me that they have been receiving their salaries in full from the club and so their sorrows are not directed at management.

Rather, the players expressed their disappointment with most of their colleagues for their actions against them. They complained bitterly about how since their injuries that has not seen them out of action for months, some of the players who were expected to know better have not even made a single telephone call to find out how they were doing.

The complain by the two players early this week is not an isolated case because Habib Mohamed also have a similar story to tell about his colleagues.

The shy to speak Habib though does not want to go public on the behaviour of his colleagues, the various conversations that I have had with him shows that he is very disappointed.

Not all these may have happened in a vacuum because incidences abound in the club where the players as a group have not cared to visit a sick or injured player.

The funny and morally illogical reason that they give for their refusal to visit their colleagues are that they did not get a similar visit when they were sick.

They could have a point there, but the question that one will have to answer is when will these incidences of self-centredness and apathy end?

Having been with the club for a little over four years now, I will say that I have observed so much absence of off the field camaraderie.

Besides the times that they meet at training and share some ‘fun’, I have observed that there is not much of a stronger player front.

This therefore will one way or the other affect the performance of the team on the field of play.

What some of the players tend to forget is that, the operative word in the union they have decided to join is a “Team”. This means that at every time be it on or off the pitch, they should be working to compliment each other for their collective success.

This to me calls for the mental re-orientation of the player to know that they should aspire to be each other’s keeper, because in the profession that they find themselves, the efforts of the attackers will be nothing if they score hundred goals and their defenders for whatever fails to secure the back and thereby allow their opponents to score a hundred or more.

So will the efforts of the defence be nothing if they successfully defend the back, whilst the attackers are unable to score a single goal to secure victory.

In both cases, the players will be the losers since Kotoko does not pay bonuses for a draw or a loss.

I normally do not like to place blame in such situations, but I think the leadership of the playing body stand culpable in this situation.

All their interest has been fighting for their monies whilst they overlook important issues such as forging a stronger player front to have a united front to seek their collective interests.

It will not be out of place for the players to have a from of a welfare association where they would be deducted a token of say two Ghana Cedis (GH¢2) per player per month from source to serve as a backbone of money from which they could make donations to their injured colleagues or better still buy a token present to a player whose wife gives birth.

Not only would this be a good source of inspiration or motivation for the players, but also give a good image of the playing body.

One way or the other, one player or more will question the timing of these suggestions looking at the fact that nothing was paid them when they were injured.

My answer to those with such intentions is that, we should look at the bigger picture and not be consumed by their egocentrics. After all, such actions make them look good in terms of their social responsibilities.

Finally, I will like to advice the captain to take a fuller grip of the player body and start series of social meetings and programmes that will make them bond better than before, because a team with a good bond does well on the field of play.