Saturday began in the usual stressful fashion as a community game was taking place before the finals day of the tournament could begin. Within the community there is a level of negative feeling towards the club as older members of the community are jealous of the opportunities the young players are getting due to the backing of projects abroad. As I argued with one of the coaches of the community teams, he responded that 'This game is more important than your tournament'.
I was dragged away from the debate by the Under 17's coach and told that I must not get involved in an argument with these members of the community as they could make our lives very difficult. As our Under 14's completed their warm up I was suddenly informed that there would be an hour long lunch break with kick off at 14:00.
When the final eventually kicked off it was a fairly uneventful match until an opposing player was sent off for what seemed a fairly innocuous challenge. Our Under 14's failed to capitalise and the game ended 0-0 going straight to penalties. The first Cantonments player blasted the ball wide and things didn't look good. At this stage my boss shouted 'Charlie...What was that?' After this penalty miss our coach went down on his knees on the sideline and began to pray, by the end of the shootout he was literally weeping. The praying seemed to work as Cantonments went on to win the shootout.
The Under 17's were impressive from the outset with arguably the most talented player in the club scoring from a 30 yard free kick. The game never looked in doubt as Cantonments cruised to a 2-0 victory. The wild celebrations after were combined with the usual problems of any public event in Ghana. As the speeches dragged on for an unnecessarily long amount of time the microphone failed.
I was dragged away from the debate by the Under 17's coach and told that I must not get involved in an argument with these members of the community as they could make our lives very difficult. As our Under 14's completed their warm up I was suddenly informed that there would be an hour long lunch break with kick off at 14:00.
When the final eventually kicked off it was a fairly uneventful match until an opposing player was sent off for what seemed a fairly innocuous challenge. Our Under 14's failed to capitalise and the game ended 0-0 going straight to penalties. The first Cantonments player blasted the ball wide and things didn't look good. At this stage my boss shouted 'Charlie...What was that?' After this penalty miss our coach went down on his knees on the sideline and began to pray, by the end of the shootout he was literally weeping. The praying seemed to work as Cantonments went on to win the shootout.
The Under 17's were impressive from the outset with arguably the most talented player in the club scoring from a 30 yard free kick. The game never looked in doubt as Cantonments cruised to a 2-0 victory. The wild celebrations after were combined with the usual problems of any public event in Ghana. As the speeches dragged on for an unnecessarily long amount of time the microphone failed.
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