Olympic Dream Over For Queens
Ghana's last hope for a 2012 Olympic football berth was dashed Saturday as the national senior female team, the Black Queens, failed to advance in their qualifiers against Ethiopia despite a 2-1 win at the El-Wak Stadium in Accra.
The Queens won alright, but the away goal rule handed the Ethiopians the victory, having won 1-0 in the first leg played in Addis Ababa two weeks ago.
The Ghanaians were desperate to win and atone for missing out on the Women’s World Cup as well and for the failure of their male counterparts, the Black Meteors, to advance in their qualifiers, but in the end, they disappointed the teeming fans who for once, turned up in their numbers at the El Wak Stadium to support them.
In all fairness, the Ethiopians deserved to qualify as they were more tactically disciplined and played to a well-rehearsed pattern as against the Queens who played out of desperation.
Indeed, the Queens laboured to win as they had to wait till deep into injury time in the first half to score their opener from a Faiza Ibrahim header. Before then, the Ethiopians had matched them boot for boot.
The second half saw some urgency in the game of the Queens as they piled on the pressure and it paid off when Leticia Zipki latched on a ball from a goal mouth scramble to score the second goal.
After the second goal, Coach A.K Edusei took a big gamble by pulling out Portia Boakye who was combining effectively with Edem Atovor for Anita Amankwa who was playing her first competitive match after several months of injury lay off. And the technical bench paid dearly for that change as Amankwa and Atovor could not co-ordinate, allowing the Ethiopians a lot of room to operate on the left.
The decision to also keep Mercy Myles, promoted from the Under-20 side, was also not one that favoured the Queens as she was unable to hold the midfield together.
Annoyingly, the Queens refused to attack more after the second goal and rather played as if the match had already been wrapped up, losing the ball easily.
As the clock ticked, the fans were urging them on for more goals but like a replay of the February 14, 2004 match against Nigeria at the Ohene Djan Stadium in Accra, the expectant spectators, including the Deputy Minister of Youth and Sports, Nii Nortey Duah, Ghana Football Association (GFA) president Kwesi Nyantakyi and other members of the GFA, were stunned in the 84th minute when Rehima Zergaw headed the Ethiopian consolation past goalkeeper Gladys Quansah, who was in posts for the Queens.
The Ethiopians then resorted to theatricals in their bid to waste time and a last-minute chance for Ghana was wasted when Fauzia Ibrahim blasted the ball over an empty net.
Obviously disappointed, Coach Edusei blamed his girls for refusing to play to instruction but the chairman of the Queens management committee put the blame on the doorstep of Edusei for the changes he made, especially his first.
But for Coach Abreham Teklehaimanot, four years of working hard on his team had finally paid off as he has been able to conquer one of the giants of African women's football.
Queens: Gladys Quansah, Sekina Mumin/Akua Sika, Edem Atovor, Rosemary Ampem, Aminatu Ibrahim,Florence Okoe, Mercy Myles, Faiza Ibrahim, Agnes Aduako,icia Zipki, Portia Boakye/Anita Amankwa.