A focus on the Ghana football team in Helsinki

Ghana team

Today, as I continue with my nar­ration of personalities or groups and their accomplishments within the Ghanaian community in Finland, I focus on the Ghana football team in Helsinki.

A focus on this football team is at the right time as the team prepares to represent the Ghanaian community in Finland in the annual all African Di­aspora summer football tournament, which is scheduled to start in late June till July this year.

The Ghana football team has started the pre-season training for the TAT summer tournament this year. The summer tournament is organ­ised every summer by the Toiminnan Avulla Työelämään (TAT), a non-profit programme under the Helsinki Young Men Christian Association, ostensibly as part of efforts for the integration of immigrants into the Finnish society, among others.

I focus on the Ghana team in Hel­sinki as a way to boost their morale for the competition ahead.

As I keep saying, there are a number of sports people (footballers, basketball players, track and field athletes, etc.), musicians and oth­ers of Ghanaian descent in the arts industry whose works deserve to be highlighted.

When the team was formed

According to Mr. Emmanuel Am­pofo, a founding member who is also popularly nicknamed as ‘Payo’, the Ghana football team was formed in early 2000.

The main idea was to bring Ghana­ian migrants together during the summer time. A Patron of the Ghana team, Payo used to be the sole spon­sor of the group for the annual sum­mer tournament.

He continues to be part of those who support the team with logistics. Payo, who owns a barber­ing salon in Helsinki and meets many immigrants, indicated to me that it is very important for immi­grants to have the oppor­tunity to come together and interact to promote unity.

Players and officials for the team

According to Payo, the team usually has talented players. Both former foot­ballers and others who simply have an interest in playing football can be recruited to play for the team.

Also, since the compet­ing teams in the tourna­ment are usually allowed to feature some ‘foreign’ players, the Ghana team often features such play­ers, including Finns, to the admiration of all.

The coach of the team, Mr Moro Abdulai, who joined the team in 2006 and became part of the technical team in 2015, reiterated the fact that through football and the team’s participation in the tournament, unity can be forged among the players and others in the Ghanaian community in Finland.

Even during the COVID-19 period when the lockdown was eased, the team was eager to play and keep up the much-needed interaction which had been reduced due to the social distancing and other restrictions re­sulting from the pandemic situation.

Mr Kofi Musa Essuman has recently been added to the technical side to assume the role of publicity/public relations.

He said he wanted to be part of the Ghana team in Helsinki to nur­ture players, due to his background with juvenile football when he was in Ghana. To him, interest among players in the team continues to grow.

Representing the Ghanaian community

Although the Ghana team initially brought together only some peo­ple who were interested in playing football and enthusiasts of the game, today the team is assuming a more promising role.

According to coach Moro, the aim is to get the team to be more represent­ative and give further meaning to it as representing the Ghanaian community, so to say.

It is undoubtedly a laudable idea. I remember that when I was the Pres­ident of the Ghana Union Finland (GUF), the association representing the Ghanaian community, there were discussions in 2019 to hand over the team to GUF. The COVID-19 situation delayed those plans, though.

Integration

There is no doubt that for migrants, such sporting activities engender so­cial cohesion and improve their inte­gration into the Finnish (host) society.

There are Finnish bodies and in­stitutions as well as migrants’ asso­ciations or social groups that help to both prepare and expose people with capabilities to the world.

Such institutions and associations are thus networks that engage in training and educating the young people interested in sports and other fields of performances.

At the end of it all, it becomes part of the ways of ensuring integration of people, including such players and even those who go on to play Finnish teams or the national teams and thus represent Finland at the international level. Thank you!

By Perpectual Crentsil

The writer is a Ghanaian lecturer at the University of Helsinki, Finland

Email: perpectualcrentsil@yahoo.com