<\/p>\n
The national amateur boxing team, the Black Bombers, continue to shine, in spite of official state neglect dominating the narrative in discussions about the medal winning sporting disciplines at the recently concluded Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.<\/p>\n
The Black Bombers hauled three medals at the Birmingham Games. Bantamweight Abraham Mensah and featherweight Joseph Commey, won silver, while Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games bronze medalist, Wahid Omar, won bronze in the light welterweight division, totalling their largest haul, at the Games, in recent memory.<\/p>\n
At the centre of attention, the Black Bombers\u2019 head coach, Dr. Ofori Asare, who also coached featherweight Samuel Takyi to his, and Africa\u2019s sole boxing medal at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics held last year, on account of the global scourge, the Covid disease, has been glowing in the spotlight.<\/p>\n
Coach Asare, born and bred in James Town, is a former boxer, taught as a juvenile by the doyen boxing coach, the late great Surpriser Sowah, the master trainer of boxing royalties, Roy Ankrah, Attuquaye Clottey (whose tutelage earned Ghana her first world boxing champion, David Kotei), Sam Ago Kotey, and Amon Kotey (a world championship bronze medalist) and F. A. Moses (a former coach of Azumah Nelson, Ghana\u2019s sole inductee into the International Boxing Hall of Fame).<\/p>\n
Yet, the highly skilled coach recognises Goodwill Ambassador, Ray Quarcoo, a former President of the Ghana Amateur Boxing Federation (GABF), now known as the Ghana Boxing Federation (GBF), as the seal to the foundations of the doyen trainer, Surpriser Sowah, of Spartan Boxing repute, and former GABF President, Eddy DuPlan.<\/p>\n
\u201cEddy DuPlan took me to a training course, in Italy, before Ray Quarcoo became the president.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen, coaching changed from diplomas and certificates to IBA Standard Coaching. Ambassador Ray Quarcoo did very well, because, at the time he was president was the time I became an (IBA) Instructor.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, he gave me that fame, because, I think he had a little bit (of) confidence in me, giving me that opportunity,\u201d says Asare, adding that Quarcoo\u2019s results-oriented approach required the highest standards. Hence, Ray Quarcoo enrolling Ofori Asare and Vincent Akai Nettey, for the IBA-accredited courses, culminating in their attainment of the sole 3-Star and 2-Star lBA licences, respectively.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnytime we went to tournaments, and the performance was not what he thought it should be, he thought, \u2018you should be able to do better\u2019. So, he even wrote me query letters,\u201d says coach Asare, a winning mentality he has imparted to guide his boxers to glory, in and outside the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cDuring his time, too,\u201d continues the coach, \u201cthe president, took the junior (national) team, of 12 boxers, between the ages of 14 and 16, including Wahid Omar, Azumah Mohammed, Musah Rahman Lawson, Sulemana Tetteh and Gibrine Ahmed, to the world championship.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019d never had (the) exposure of going outside, but during Ray Quarcoo\u2019s time, all boxers were given a chance to improve, and prove themselves.<\/p>\n
\u201cAlso, he took the Black Bombers (including Maxwell Amponsah and Frederick Lawson) to the senior world championship, in Italy, and the boxer known as Akuffo Addo, to the senior world championship, in Chicago, a Beijing 2008 Olympic qualifier.<\/p>\n
\u201cI learned, a lot, during his time, (by) going to those competitions, being exposed.<\/p>\n
\u201cAlso, I remember, on the road to the (London) 2012 Olympics, the IBA had set up a training camp in Wales, and he (Ray Quarcoo) was able to connect us to the training camp of IBA, to be trained by their elite coaches, in preparations for the 2012 Olympics. It was also a learning process for me. So, it was (during) his time that I learned more.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, I can say he and Eddy DuPlan (a predecessor of Ray Quarcoo) created the base, from which we\u2019re getting all these benefits,\u201d concludes Ofori Asare.<\/p>\n
Those \u201cbenefits\u201d include Australia 2018 Commonwealth Games bronze medalist, light middleweight Jessie Lartey, and Birmingham 2022 bronze medalist, light welterweight, Wahid Omar.<\/p>\n
Other beneficiaries, Birmingham Games\u2019 silver medalists Abraham Mensah and Joseph Commey, popularly known as Jaguar, have declared their determination to continue to hold high the national flag for the Ghana 2023 African Games, targeting gold medals, in readiness to take the Paris 2024 Olympics, by storm, to build on the success story of former Black Bomber, featherweight Samuel Takyi, who snatched Africa\u2019s sole boxing medal at the Tokyo Olympics, held last year.<\/p>\n
Those goals, while lofty, are attainable by the ambitious fighters, tapping into the physical, tactical, physiological, technical and psychological tutelage of the IBA instructor named Ofori Asare, a great beneficiary of the Ray Quarcoo legacy.<\/p>\n
From The Sports Desk<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\t<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The national amateur boxing team, the Black Bombers, continue to shine, in spite of official state neglect dominating the narrative in discussions about the medal winning sporting disciplines at the recently concluded Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games. The Black Bombers hauled three medals at the Birmingham Games. Bantamweight Abraham Mensah and featherweight Joseph Commey, won silver, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1194772,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[15960,1715,24745,15632],"class_list":["post-1194771","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-legacy","tag-lives","tag-quarcoo","tag-ray"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1194771","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1194771"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1194771\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1194771"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1194771"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1194771"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}