THE MODERN FOOTBALL OF GHANA

The Dispute Resolution Committee of the Ghana Football Association will begin the process of arbitration into a petition filed by Vincent Sowah Odotei to the Executive Committee over his candidature for election for the Presidency.

Also, the petition by Neil Armstrong-Mortagbe has been directed to the same body though no date has been fixed yet for the start of the arbitration process.

Both individuals filed separate notices with the Ex.Co, contesting the decision of the Elections Committee to disqualify their candidatures to contest for the office of the President.

The Ghana national football team, popularly known as the Black Stars, is the national association football team of Ghana and is controlled by the Ghana Football Association. Before gaining independence from Great Britain in 1957, the country played as the Gold Coast.

Although the team did not qualify for the senior FIFA World Cup until 2006, they had qualified for five straight Olympic Games Football Tournaments when the tournament was still a full senior national team competition. The team has won the Africa Cup of Nations four times (in 1963, 1965, 1978, and 1982), making Ghana the second most successful team in the contest's history, behind Egypt. The Olympic Team, the Black Meteors, in 1992 became the first African country to win a medal at football.

After going through 2005 unbeaten, Ghana won the FIFA most improved team of the year award and they reached the second round of the 2006 FIFA World Cup led by Serbian football coach, Ratomir Dujković.

At the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, they became the third African team in history to reach the World Cup quarter-finals.

The Ghana Amateur Football Association was founded in 1957, soon after the country's independence, and was affiliated to both CAF and FIFA the following year, Englishman George Ainsley being appointed coach of the national team.

In 1960 the Black Stars played Spanish giants Real Madrid, who were at the time Spanish, European and intercontinental champions, and drew 3–3.

Charles Kumi Gyamfi became coach in 1961, and Ghana won successive Africa Cup of Nations titles, in 1963 and 1965, and achieved their record win, 13–0 away to Kenya, shortly after the second of these. They also reached the final of the tournament in 1968 and 1970, losing 1–0 on each occasion, to DR Congo and Sudan respectively. Their domination of this tournament earned the country the nickname of "the Brazil of Africa" in the 1960s. The team had no success in FIFA World Cup qualification during this era, and failed to qualify for three successive African Cup of Nations in the 1970s, but qualified for the Olympic Games Football Tournaments, reaching the quarter finals in 1964 and withdrawing on political grounds in 1976 and but making little progress in continent-wide competitions until the appointment of Burkhard Ziese as coach in 1991.

A new generation of players who went to the 2001 FIFA World Youth Championship final became the core of the team at the 2002 African Cup of Nations and the 2004 Olympic Games, and were undefeated for a year in 2005 and reached the finals of the 2006 FIFA World Cup, the first time the team had reached the global stage of the tournament. Ghana started with a 2–0 defeat to eventual champions Italy, but wins over the Czech Republic (2–0) and USA (2–1) saw them through to the second round, where they were beaten 3–0 by Brazil.

The Black Stars went on to secure a 100 percent record in their qualification campaign, winning the group and becoming the first African team to qualify for 2010 FIFA World Cup. The World Cup Draw in Cape Town on the 4 December 2009 saw the Ghanaian team being placed alongside Germany, Serbia and Australia in Group D. They were able to reach the last 16 where they played the USA, defeating them 2–1 in extra time to become the third African nation to reach the World Cup quarter finals. They then lost on penalties to Uruguay in the quarter finals, having missed a penalty in extra time after a certain goal was saved off the line by Luis Suarez's deliberately parried handball who was then shown a red card for his action.

The Ghana Football Association is the governing body of football (soccer) in Ghana, based in Accra.
It is on record that the game of Football was introduced into the Gold Coast towards the close of the 19th century by Merchants from Europe, who had then invaded the coastal areas and built forts and castles to enhance their trading activities either in merchandise or human cargo. The sailors at their leisure times played football among themselves and sometimes with a select side of the indigenous people. The popularity of the game spread like wild fire within a short time along the coast culminating in the formation of the first football club, EXCELSIOR in 1903 by Mr. Briton, a Jamaican born British, who was then Head Teacher of Philip Quaicoe Government Boys School in Cape Coast. As the popularity of the game grew, other clubs along the coast, namely: Accra Hearts of Oak, Cape Coast Venomous Vipers, Cape Coast Mysterious Dwarfs, Sekondi Hasaacas and Sekondi Eleven Wise all amateur clubs were formed.