Accra (Greater Accra) 04 December 2001 - Aloi Moyoyo, leading contender to the national heavyweight boxing title leaves Accra on December 20 for London to begin a new era in his career.
While in the United Kingdom Moyoyo will be under the guidance and tutelage of the Simms bothers, John and Steve who manage Miguel Gym in Brixton.
Mr Vincent Mc Bean, Chief Executive of Knights Institute of Sports told the GNA Sports that his company has signed on Moyoyo in order to assist him reap the full benefits of his potentials.
Moyoyo has a record of three wins in as many fights, all by way of knockout since turning professional last year. His victims include Ibrahim Marshall and 'Man Mountain' Joe Addo.
The Chief Executive said Moyo will team up with Robert Kutsokey a top Ghanaian welterweight boxer who is already under his care and undergo a three dimensional training schedule which would bring out the best in them.
Mr Mc Bean, the Jamaican boxing manager, said the regiment of the two boxers would be made up of tutorials in boxing, English Language and Information
Technology.
He said the aim of the tri-dimensional training schedule is to teach the two boxers "fully fledged comprehensive boxing," which would enable them to make correct choices in the ring.
The boxing manager said the course would prepare them to assess their opponents in the ring, pick their punches and decide on what to do at a given time in a fight.
He assured Ghanaian boxing fans that they would see a different Kutsokey from the one they knew when he fights in a title fight at the Kaneshie Sports Complex on February 8, 2002.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 December 2001.3, GNA-Achimota Golf Club will hold a special competition on Friday, December 7, as part of activities marking the celebration of this year's Farmers Day.
Mr Gilbert C. Morgan, Captain of the Club who announced this in Accra on Monday, said the one-day 18-hole stable-ford event being sponsored by the Club, is expected to attract over 150 participants.
He named some of the participants who have registered for the event as Yaw Assah-Sam, Wisdom Asempa, Nick Smallman, Nana Kantanko, Michael Aggrey, Norman
Swanepoel and Victor Danku.
He said the Club has at stake, very attractive prizes and expressed the hope that golfers would exhibit their skills and win the prizes.
The immediate past President, Nana Wereko Ampem the second, Mr Ishmael Yamson, President, both of the Club will address the golfers after the competition.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 December 2001 - The dreaded demon of captaincy, often showing up ahead of big tournaments to eat away some of the Black Stars concentration, has surfaced again with predictable consequences, according to the Graphic Sports.
An otherwise straight forward matter, the mishandling of which caused the Black Stars severely at the 1992 Cup of Nations in Senegal and also at a friendly match in the German town of Bochum, the current crisis is pointing at potential trouble for Ghana at next month's Nations Cup in Mali.
It erupted from the announcements by head coach Fred Osam-Duodu, in which he released his provisional list for the Mali assignment in which skipper Charles Akonnor was conspicuously absent. The coach took sole responsibility for the bombshell that also saw the exit of such old faithfuls as Sam Johnson, Kwame Ayew, Yaw Preko, and others.
Akonnor, who presently captains German Bundesliga side VfL Wolfsburg, was livid at the decision to exclude him from the team and failure of the FA or coach to communicate the decision to him first, and instead took a swipe at his predecessor and GFA Management board member Abedi Pele for orchestrating his exit.
"Abedi did that and I don't know why. I knew what was going on before the decision was announced because I have my sources. He (Abedi) called Kuffour and told him the captainship was going to be taken away from me," Akonnor told Accra-based Radio Station, Radio Gold, from his German base. And, in another interview on Joy FM, he attributed his exit to "hatred" by some people within the football administration.
Pele, however, could not come to terms with Akonnor's anger and described his criticisms as unjustified and without merit. "This is the coach's decision and the FM Management Board's duty is to support and make him succeed," he responded.
"I have nothing against him. The Board decided that Kuffour should be captain after the coach dropped Akonnor from the team and as their linkman I was mandated to talk to Kuffour about it."
The former captain who had played for the Stars since 1992 yesterday claimed he was bitter at the authorities for failing to deal with him with the needed courtesy and respect.
"Even if they did not need my services again I believe I've done some good things for the country and deserve that kind of respect. It's embarrassing."
The Wolfsburg captain, who has not featured for Ghana since February, hinted that his playing days with the Stars are effectively over and threw his weight behind his Bayern pal and soul brother to lead the Stars to Mali.
As deputy captain, Kuffour stands out as the likely successor to Akonnor, but on Radio Gold yesterday, the Bayern star stated categorically that he was not ready to take up any such leadership role under this controversy since it has the potential of creating problems within the team.
"I'm not interested in the captainship. This has brought a lot of problems in the team, and bad blood between Abedi and Akwasi Appaih. I don't want to be hated because of this," he said. "Ghanaians love me and I don't want to be seen as the bad guy. I want to be free".
In solidarity with his team-mate, Kuffour, who is in reckoning for the African best player title expressed "disappointment" that the issue was not handled professionally, and could affect Akonnor's psyche in Wolfsburg. However he was confident the issue would not create any bad blood between them.
In spite of the hue and cry over the handling of the issue, Pele was convinced neither Osam-Duodu nor the FA erred by not communicating the decision to Akonnor before making it public. Rather he believes that position was necessary only if Akonnor was still a member of the team but lost the captainship. "He faces the same dilemma as those other players who have been dropped and not been talked to."
However he noted that, if Kuffour declines the captain's armband, as he stated on Radio Gold, then Ghana must take a cue from the French who, in search for a new team leader, rotated the captainship among their top stars during the build-up to France '98 before settling on Didier Descshamps.
"We can also use our friendly matches to assess the player best suited to lead the team. That affords the coach the chance to see which player has the power, charisma and what it takes to lead. The criterion must be leadership qualities and not long service to the team," Abedi stressed.
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