AG 2019: Ghana bows out of African Games after Mali defeat

The National Under -20 team, the Black Satellites were eliminated from the male division of the African Games, after a 4-2 defeat at the hands of Mali, at the Center Sportif of FAR in Rabat, Morocco on Saturday.

It is as the final group game that the team needed a win to advance to the next stage of the competition, but they were just not good enough to make progress.

The Satellites failed to glitter after two goalkeeping errors from Danlad Ibrahim saw them bow out of the competition.

The Malians were the much stronger side and dominated play in every department of game.

They succeeded in securing the opener in the 11th minute when Ibrahim’s failure to deal with an aerial ball, saw Chaka Ballo tapping in cooly for the opener.

Mali were gifted a penalty in the 29th minute, but Abdoulaye Kanou shot into the hands of keeper Ibrahim.

However, it was not enough to save them from a humiliating first half as Kama redeemed himself by tapping in another gifted opportunity when Ibrahim failed to make a first grab of the ball in the 40th minute to end the first half.

Ghana lifted her game up in the second half and mounted intense pressure on their opponents to reduce the tally in the 47th minute when Tahiru Awudu pushedthe ball into the net in a melee.

Afterwards, the Satellites created some decent chances but failed to covert.

Mali resumed dominance and scored two goals within five minutes through Ibrahima Sangare in the 64th and 66th minutes with the first one being a solo effort.

Tahiru scrambled in another ball to reduce the tally.
Both sides made some efforts at goal but not good enough to change the scoreline.

Line Up: Danlad Ibrahim, Kobina Amoah, Philip Osei, Haruna Abubakar, Najeeb Yakubu, Isaac Gyamfi, Basit Umar, Emmanuel Toku Mathew Cudjoe, Daniel Adjetey, Awudu Tahiru.

-GNA