CAF won’t accept ‘potato’ pitches in Africa again- Sannie Daara

Former Communications Director of the Ghana Football Association, Ibrahim Sannie Daara has said that the new Confederation of African Football (CAF) administration has made it their mission to crack down on bad pitches.

Bad pitches in Africa have come up in the news again after reports went rife that CAF/FIFA have rejected the Cape Coast Sports Stadium as venue for the World Cup qualifier between Ghana and Nigeria because of the bad nature of the pitch.

According to Sannie Daara, the rejection of the Cape Coast Sports Stadium is in line with the administration’s vision to project African football to a standard at par with other continental football federations.

“CAF President Patrice Motsepe has been talking about bad pitches because other facilities are important but the pitches are what people see on the eye and if you have dodgy pitches, potato-like farm looking like pitches it sends a bad image of African football.

“So, it’s about time that not only Ghana but countries across Africa realize that there’s a new wind of change blowing and that is to expect that there are some level of quality pitches. We have top quality players; very expensive footballers and these players will come and play on these Potato pitches,” he said on JoyNews’ PM Express Tuesday.

The first leg of the Qatar 2022 World Cup qualifiers between Ghana and Nigeria, was supposed to be played in Cape Coast Stadium.

However, the Ghana Football Association has proposed that the game be played at Baba Yara Stadium instead since Cape Coast has been rejected due to the damages of the infrastructure following Ghana’s independence celebrations on Sunday, March 4, 2022.