Sports analystKojo Addae-Mensah has warned that Ghana’s efforts to improve youth football will yield limited results unless the country addresses the poor condition of pitches where young players learn the game.

Speaking on theAsaase Breakfast Show on Friday (21 August) after the Ghana Football Association’s congress at Prampram, Addae-Mensah said coach education and youth development programmes were important but could not be separated from the quality of playing surfaces available to young footballers.

The GFA announced an investment of GH¢1.8 million to train 600 grassroots coaches, a move Addae-Mensah described as important for the long-term development of Ghanaian football.

But he questioned how effectively coaches could develop young players when many grassroots pitches are uneven, grassless or otherwise unsuitable for technical training.

“Who is teaching the kids how to trap a ball at the grassroots?” he asked.

He argued that technical skills acquired during a player’s formative years could remain with them throughout their careers, making the quality of grassroots coaching particularly important.

However, he said poor playing surfaces could undermine those efforts.

“You cannot train a guy how to control a ball properly on a bad pitch,” Addae-Mensah said.

According to him, the condition of Ghana’s pitches also affects the way players develop their awareness and technique.

He compared the experience of young Ghanaian players with those developed in Europe, arguing that players who grow up on poor surfaces may have to concentrate on avoiding holes and uneven patches instead of keeping their heads up and reading the game.

“When Rodri was growing up, he didn’t have to look on the floor to make sure that the place his leg is, doesn’t have a hole on the pitch that will break his leg,” he said.

Addae-Mensah said the problem required a coordinated approach rather than isolated interventions.

He suggested that investment in pitches should complement the GFA’s plans to train grassroots coaches, arguing that improving one without the other would limit the overall impact of youth development programmes.

He also criticised what he described as Ghana’s growing reliance on artificial turf without sufficient consideration of the quality and suitability of the surfaces being installed.

“There’s a lot of stories about astroturf. Whoever brought that idea, I don’t know,” he said.

Addae-Mensah argued that Ghana should examine its approach to pitch development and focus on creating playing environments that allow young players to develop properly.

He also criticised the tendency to look abroad for solutions while failing to strengthen Ghana’s domestic football structures.

On the GFA’s proposed diaspora strategy to identify Ghanaian talent abroad, he said the policy was not inherently wrong because the Ghanaian diaspora represented a legitimate pool of players.

But he warned that it should not become a substitute for developing players locally.

“We have a diasporan pool of talent that we should not ignore,” he said. “But it doesn’t mean you ignore your local situation.”

Addae-Mensah pointed to Morocco’s use of diaspora players as evidence that countries could benefit from talent developed abroad while continuing to invest in domestic football.

He said Ghana risked choosing an easier route by focusing heavily on players who had already developed in foreign academies instead of fixing weaknesses in the local system.

“It’s like we’re looking for low-hanging fruits, the easy way out,” he said.

He argued that the success of Ghana’s domestic youth development should ultimately be measured by whether young players could progress through a functioning local pathway into the senior national team and professional football.

As an example of what could be achieved domestically, he cited the Right to Dream academy, saying its development model had already produced several players who went on to represent Ghana.

Addae-Mensah said the model could be studied and replicated rather than simply celebrated.

“The template is there,” he said, arguing that Ghanaian football authorities needed to focus on executing proven approaches.

Asked to identify the single GFA initiative with the greatest potential to transform Ghanaian football, Addae-Mensah settled on youth development.

“Let me not use quotes, but youth development. Let me put it in that broad sense. Youth development will change,” he said.

He said the results should be assessed over several years rather than immediately, with improvements in coaching, facilities and player development providing indicators of whether the strategy was working.