The Ghana National Amputee Football team, the Black Challenge, put the disappointment of not making it to the medal zone behind them to beat Japan 6-2 in their first match at the Amputee Football World Cup in Culiacan, Sinaloa in Mexico on Friday.
The team played a spirited game to put their Japanese counterparts to sleep with three goals in each half.
Richard Ekwam, Collins Gyamfi (2), Richard Arthur Opentil and Mubarak Mohammed (2) scored the goals for Ghana in a match that brought out the true fighting spirit of the Ghanaians.
The Black Challenge, after thirty hours of flight, arrived in Mexico City in the morning of Wednesday, December 3, but couldn’t get the connecting flight to Culiacan, thereby denying them of the opportunity to play England in a delayed match.
Two matches had been delayed for Wednesday to enable the Ghanaians make it to the next stage after the competition had started on Sunday.
Attempts by the leadership of the team to force a postponement of the match to Thursday didn’t materialize after the earlier change in date.
The Black Challenge will now play Mexico on Saturday for placement on the world ranking even though the World Amputee Football Federation (WAFF) admits it is not very indicative of Ghana’s true position in the world.
Ghana’s delegation left Accra on Monday, December 1, after late issuance of visas and ticketing. The leadership sought WAFF’s waiver to allow the match on Wednesday but the Ghanaian team couldn’t connect a flight from Mexico City where the only direct flight was at 4:00, just about 30 minutes to the match against Britain.
Interestingly, the flight delayed for 30 minutes and put the match beyond possibility for a journey of about two hours.
Ghana was in Group F with England and Angola.