Ghana Booked For Angola In AFCON Qualifiers Opener
Ghana’s campaign in the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) tournament qualifiers will begin at home against Angola, the schedule for the qualifiers released by the Confederation of Africa Football (CAF) notes.
The qualifiers will spring from September to November during which Ghana will try and book a place for the continental tournament to make up for their abysmal performance in the 2023 edition.
Per the schedule, Matchday one and two will take place from September 2-10, 2024; Matchday three and four from October 7-15, 2024; and Matchday five and six from November 11-19, 2024.
After their clash with the Palancas Negras, Coach Otto Addo’s side will proceed to Niger for the second game in September.
Their two fixtures in October will be against Sudan before their final round against Angola and Niger in return fixtures.
Ghana as part of Group F will be hoping for one of the two top spots in the group to make it to the next tournament.
Meanwhile, the head coach of the Black Stars, Otto Addo, is preparing for a tough campaign in the qualifiers.
Though Ghana rank above all these nations on paper, he observes that all three have proven in recent displays to be better and a force to reckon with on the field.
Reflecting on the campaign of Angola in the 2023 AFCON, their performance in the COSAFA Cup and their sterling showpiece in the World Cup qualifiers, he stated, “I think they have a very, very good squad… They have a strong squad and we can’t take it easy. It’s going to be tough, it’s going to be close.”
On the Akwasi Appiah-led Sudan, Otto said, “They are not a known squad but like I said, they are doing really, really good at the moment in the World Cup qualification games, very, very tough to beat. It’s going to be a really big challenge to beat them and for this, we have to be at 100% best.”
He thinks it’s not going to be any easy with Niger.
“They don’t have a good record in their last five, six, seven, eight matches. I think they won one, played some draws and lost the other games. But what you can see is that, when they lost they just lost by a lone goal. So it’s going to be tough. All the other teams are finding it tough playing against Niger so it’s going to be tough for us as well. We have to be at our 100% best to beat everyone.
“There is no small team in Africa at the moment. You saw at the last AFCON that very, very strong and known teams had problems with the so-called unknown teams so it’s going to be tough but I think we have the quality to beat all of them. But it’s going to be close, it’s going to be tough, there are no easy games.”
In spite of this, he is confident Ghana will sail through to qualify for the tournament.
Ghana can boast of winning the Nations Cup four times in 1963, 1965, 1978 and 1982.
Their last campaign in Cote d’Ivoire ended in embarrassment under Coach Chris Hughton as they exited at the Group stage.
