Ghana Can Beat Portugal, Says a legend
The legendary African footballer Kalusha Bwalya believes Ghana, Black Stars, can surprise Portugal at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.
Bwalya said this when giving his expert analysis on SuperSport TV in the build-up to the World Cups kick-off on Sunday.
Ghana’s Group H campaign gets underway against one of the tournament favorites, the Cristiano Ronaldo-led Portugal.
The former PSV star noted that inferiority complexes contribute to African teams’ frequent World Cup failures.
Bwalya said, “We have that defeatist attitude as Africans to look at them and say: ‘oh we are playing against Portugal’ or ‘oh we are playing against France.’ Sometimes, we always think the Europeans are very high, that they are supreme.”
WHAT GHANA SHOULD FOCUS ON
The legendary footballer from Zambia advised Ghana to not show Portugal too much respect and instead concentrate on their strengths and self-belief.
“Ghana is quite powerful; they can travel there and compete with the greatest in the world. I think they have a chance to win the first game,” he remarked.
The former head of the Football Association of Zambia emphasized how crucial Ghana’s competition-opening victory was.
There are only three games, and the first game of a tournament is crucial, according to Bwalya.
“If you lose the first game then hand breaks are out. You expose yourself, you go in the next game, you risk everything then you are on your way back.”
🗣 Kalusha Bwalya believes Ghana are good enough to beat Portugal in the opening game despite the drama in the Portuguese camp 👇#WelcomeToYourWeekend pic.twitter.com/CZO3y0rOTC
— SuperSport Football ⚽️ (@SSFootball) November 19, 2022
WHAT THE COACH SAID
The Black Stars’ performance against Switzerland in the most recent warm-up, according to Ghana coach Otto Addo, gave him hope.
It’s great for the players to know that we can score goals like this while still creating opportunities, he remarked.
“I believe we did well. The way we played, going deep, having the right timing for the deep runs, and good positions in the middle of the field are also important factors.
On Wednesday, the Black Stars defeated the Swiss team 2-0. Other groups-stage opponents for Ghana are South Korea and Uruguay.
Ghana is representing Africa at the World Cup alongside Cameroon, Senegal, Tunisia, and Morocco