The Ghanaian football fan seems to have been fed up with local football by now. If not for the Black Stars of Ghana, lot of the local football fans wouldn’t have had any contact with football made in Ghana again.
There are a few dedicated ones though and these dedicated ones still keep the fire burning in their various communities despite the obvious impediments.
A simple chat with Kotoko Circle members and Hearts Chapter members reveal that a lot of football fans are still interested in the local game.
The worrying thing about the local game however is that, the fans are being starved of images of the game they have vowed to follow no matter the extent of its sinking depth.
The Television rights in Ghana is such that a single Television station has the right to broadcast the game live while a lot of radio stations have the chance to run commentary on the game.
Hard to see fans in such numbers in recent times
Fans can therefore listen to the views of commentators on radio and unfortunately are incapable of seeing the pictures of the stars that are discussed week in week out.
A lot of talents have being cited as intelligent and capable of handling matters in the Black Stars team but unfortunately the local football fan hasn’t had the opportunity to watch them, to ascertain the veracity or otherwise of this assertion.
A colleague was worrying his head over the incapability of soccer fans to name the first eleven of teams in the Ghana but could easily mention those of foreign leagues.
I found the worry extremely ridiculous and told him the obvious truth. “If not in contact then there is no way one can learn about something”. The local football fan has lost contact with the local clubs because there are no visible inscriptions that indicate what the good boys are made up of.
The Rooneys and Ronaldos of foreign leagues are watched on the television sets week in week out and have the attention of local football fans who crave for good football.
Emmanuel Baffour has been an excellent player for New Edubiase in the local league but unfortunately, not everyone has seen the magic he is made up of. The truth of the matter is that, a lot of football commentators have not even had the chance to see any of his over twenty goals as yet.
Other players such as Mahatma Otoo, Uriah Asante and Ollenu Ashitey all of Hearts of Oak, Nii Adjei, Ben Acheampong and Kofi Nti Boakye of Kotoko , Francis Narh, Abdullai Mohammed and Kofi Mensah of Tema Youth, Richard Mpong, Asiedu Atobrah and a host of other players have been mentioned in one way or the other in the local football league but it will be quite difficult for one to put a name to the face of these local players.
Few fans see Hearts celebrate this way
The ones from Kotoko and Hearts might get some luck because their fans normally take note of them on the field of play but the majority of these soccer fans haven’t seen the videos of their local football icons.
It is pathetic; it is so easy for foreign players to be named and recognized so easily because their pictures and videos are all over our television sets and newspapers but regrettably enough, there are few that can be seen in the newspapers and on television sets.
I have looked at the Graphic Sports in recent times and any time I see the front page, I shudder.
The newspaper stood for local football some time back but recently, the foreign leagues have taken control of both the front page and middle pages.
We have lost it, it seems. We have given priority to the foreign leagues over our own and so the state owned newspaper also feels the only means of making profit is to showcase the Messis and Torres of foreign leagues.
When this is done, and as it is being done, the football fan in the country is being starved. He is being starved of the real quality; if it existed, in the local league. He is being denied the chance to have ample evidence to make a case for a local football star when names are being mentioned for the national teams. He is being denied the opportunity to challenge other football leagues with the quality that we have in our game.
The pathetic event we are made to do with is the fact that seven out of ten soccer fans in the country will condemn the local league immediately it is brought up in discussions. They tend to associate it with all the negativities though in the hidden nutshell they either refuse to pay and watch the games or don’t even get the chance to watch the games on TV.
For fans in parts of the country that don’t have access to the Television channel that broadcast live the local league games, there is no chance that they will see the players.
I had a chat with the GFA spokesperson, Sannie Darra about the rights involving television some weeks back and his comment was that television stations could go for the video highlights of the league games from the parent league broadcasting station, but unfortunately this is not being done.
What these TV stations are expected to do is only to highlight the logo of the parent league broadcasting station when highlighting the local game. It is still a puzzle as to why this simple credit(in my view) can’t be granted Metro TV.
The issue is a huge one in a hidden shell. The local radio stations have resorted to running commentaries of foreign football leagues at the moment, thereby promoting the foreign brand when it has already had the best of marketing in their part of the world.
I have heard countless radio commentaries of the Spanish la liga so have I heard commentaries of some key English Premier League games.
Aside these, the Champions League competition in Europe gets much publicity in Ghana even when a Broadcasting channel like the BBC International, though Britain based, runs its normal business.
I personally have my reservations with that but that is the reality we have been made to live with at the moment.
Fans don’t always get the chance to see Kotoko players
The local football fan has been made to associate with the foreign leagues to the extent that local businesses will want to sponsor these foreign football events to the detriment to the local ones that badly need money for survival.
So from newspaper through radio to TV, the local football fan is being starved of statistics, pictures, videos and news that is worthy of presentation.
The country has a long way to go. In other quarters the reasons for this canker and the means to curb it have been outlined.
In this piece, the only problem I have sought to raise is that we all know there is a problem at hand but the media has failed to tackle it in their own small way.
Television stations have been hindered by television rights and so are not showing any highlights, the radio stations have failed to make the local players the centre of interest in their discussions and so have the newspapers sought to get their targeted financial benefits with the already foreign-media-cooked-players.
Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and the Manchester Uniteds, Barcelonas and Real Madrids have dominated our media platforms depriving the local football fan the chance to have a feel of what the country has in terms of football.
Kindly share your thoughts with me on this topic.
Do follow me on Twitter, @AngeloBenjy for more Ghana football tweets.
Ghana Football Affairs, GhFA 