Asante Kotoko goalkeeper, Razak Abalorah
• Abalora committed a blunder in the Black Stars game against Morocco
• His form at both club and national team levels has been poor lately
• Damba believes that needs time to work on himself
Former Ghana goalkeeper Abukari Damba has opined that goalkeeper Razak Abalora should be given time to deal with whatever psychological issue he is going through currently.
Abalora is having a difficult time at both club and national team level with repeated mistakes in matches.
He was recently relegated to the bench at Asante Kotoko after he fluffed his lines a few times and gifted goals.
At the Black Stars level where he is the second choice, Abalora has committed two obvious errors in his last two games, the second of which was against Morocco on Tuesday.
In an interview with Africa-foot, Damba said the goalkeeper must come to the realization that he is not in the best shape and work towards correcting his mistakes.
“It is Abalora who has to take up the mantle himself. He has to bring himself out to say that I accept every responsibility and I need to work at it. He needs to be given time off to work on these challenges and come back stronger.
“He has a problem and we have to appreciate it. Let us not aggravate the problem by putting more pressure on him because he is under pressure so let’s help him out,” Abukari Damba told Africa-foot.com.
Black Stars coach CK Akonnor has meanwhile appealed to Ghanaians to support Abalora. In a post-match interview Akonnor said Abalora will be given opportunity to rebuild his form and confidence.
“Yes, we have to move on, we have to encourage him. He is a good goalkeeper. No doubt about that. We will not kill him; we will encourage him on how to improve,” coach CK Akonnor said in a post-match interview.
Akonnor’s comments will excite Aduana stars skipper Yahaya Mohammed who is calling for support for Abalora.
“But for now, it’s [Razak] Abalora and Richard Ofori who are available. We are going for a tournament [2021 AFCON], are we now going to build the confidence of a new goalkeeper for the tournament.?
“Razak Abalora has already built his confidence having played a couple of matches. So the technical team must help Razak Abalora correct the mistakes. The psychologist and the technical team must help him and even his spiritual aspect must be checked.