GFA Overwhelmed By Interest In Technical Director Post

The Ghana Football Association (GFA) has been overwhelmed by the horde of applicants who are chasing its vacant technical director’s position.

Barely two weeks after the deadline, applications continue to pour in from across the globe, leaving the GFA dumbfounded.

The General Secretary of the GFA, Prosper Harrison-Addo, who disclosed this to the Daily Graphic in an exclusive interview yesterday, said all late applications would only be reconsidered if the applicants who beat the deadline fail to meet the FA’s expectations.

• Deadline for applications

The FA set Friday, March 20, 2020, as the deadline for applications for the top job which was left vacant by veteran coach, Francis Oti-Akenten.

Coach Oti-Akenten, who was also a CAF Education Director, went on retirement on March 31, 2020, after serving in that capacity for 14 years.

He told the Daily Graphic in a separate interview yesterday that he was yet to hand over officially due to the COVID-19 outbreak.

• Applications still pouring in

Mr Harrison-Addo, who kept receiving applications in his e-mail during the interview, was at a loss about the turn of events while the deadline had long elapsed.

“People are still sending in applications after the deadline but those ones can only be considered after the earlier applicants have been screened,” he explained.

He, however, could not hazard a guess in relation to the number of applications so far received but only said that the number was quite overwhelming.

• Few Ghanaian applicants

Stopping short of disclosing the identity of some of the applicants for fairness sake, the GFA scribe disclosed that the exercise had attracted applications from a lot of countries in the world.

According to him only a few Ghanaians applied for the job.

• Denial of Desailly rumours

He quickly debunked speculations linking Ghanaian-born former French international, Marcel Desailly, to that sensitive position.

He was quite evasive about the process the FA would employ to arrive at the best applicant but only stated that the candidate would be announced shortly.

“When we are through with the process we will announce the winner as soon as possible,” he assured.

The eventual winner, to be based at the Ghanaman Soccer Centre of Excellence in Prampram, will supervise all the national teams and also restructure Ghana Football from the grassroot to the senior national team, the Black Stars.