Ghana rubbish Bafana protest

THE Ghanaian Football Association (GFA) yesterday issued a statement condemning the South African Football Association (SAFA) for spreading “falsehoods” in the aftermath of Ghanas controversial 1-0 World Cup qualifier win over South Africa last weekend.

The game consigned the South Africans to elimination from the World Cup qualifiers while Ghana advanced to the final round.

Ghanas winning goal came from a first-half penalty, when Daniel Amartey went down following what appeared minimal contact from defender Rushine de Reuck.

The Fifa disciplinary code allows protests based on “an obvious error” by a referee.

There was a clear pattern of match manipulation during South Africas 2022 World Cup qualifier against Ghana, according to South African Football Association (Safa) president Danny Jordaan.

Safa lodged a complaint with Fifa about the match and the world governing body, in a letter dated 17 November, said the protest will be submitted to a member of its disciplinary committee on 23 November for consideration.

South Africas protest included allegations of “match fixing, match manipulation including corruption and bribery”, which Jordaan claimed may be linked to gambling at a press conference on Wednesday.

“How is it that theres a betting spike just before a major decision is taken and therefore people bet? They knew when to bet,” he said.

While Ghana believe that the South Africans are within their rights to call for a review of the refereeing in the game, they believe that South Africa are not acting in a constructive manner.

“We wish to state categorically that the allegations are frivolous, baseless, lack merits and should be treated with all the contempt that it deserves. These allegations from the South African Football Association are nothing but a planned scheme and a calculated attempt to shift focus from the defeat,” said the GFA statement.

The Ghanaian Football Association also slammed suggestions that the Bafana Bafana team was subjected to bad treatment while in the West African nation.

“It is shocking, irresponsible and outright disrespect to note that our colleagues from South African Football Association (with whom we have good relationships and mutual sporting respect) have chosen to spread falsehoods to the media rather than project the real picture of events before, during and after the game,” the GFA said.

A comprehensive report on the match had been compiled by former South African referee Ace Ncobo and will be used as part of Safas protest with Fifa.

Ncobo said he picked up 71 major incidents from the match where he believes that the referee either turned a blind eye in favour of Ghana or made incorrect calls against the South African team.

So far there has been no comment from anyone on the officiating team for the match, who all come from Senegal and were headed up by referee Maguette Ndiaye.

It is understood that, according to Fifa rules, Ndiaye is not permitted to comment on officiating decisions.

Refereeing expert Ncobo said he found sufficient discrepancies during his analysis of the match which point to possible manipulation by match officials to back up Safas protest.

“This is what I discovered when I analysed them. This is just coming out of the first half. There was an average of one major incident per minute when major incidents, game-changing incidents, where the other team gains possession from whatever decision that has been taken, 45 major incidents in the first half, number of ignored or not seen.

“For whatever reason, I dont want to speculate on the reason, thats for SAFA to investigate, why there were 17 out of 45 major incidents, that the whistle was never blown. Now, the number of awarded out of the 45, only 28 were awarded, because the 17 were ignored.” – Adapted from IOL.co.za