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Ghana reaped what we sowed at Rio Olympics

Ghana sent 16 athletes to the Rio 2016 Olympics, from but none managed to qualify from the first stage of any event.

Ghana have not won a medal at the Olympic Games since 1992 in Barcelona and the reason for this is simple; the sporting authority in Ghana continues to value an ad hoc approach to preparation.

The Ghana Olympic Committee before the team's departure had stated unequivocally that medals were a pipe dream with a focus rather on building experience for future games.

However, it will be a great surprise come Tokyo in 2020 if Ghana builds on this so called experience from Rio. Excuse the cynicism but the same song will be sang like a bad song on loop.

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Read more:Rio Olympic Games

I struggle with critics who blame athletes for the poor displays. We can’t fault the athletes when authorities do not have a profound understanding of the dynamics of modern sports. There is a strategy that has been implemented by a host of countries but trust Ghana to be blind.

There are no proper programmes in place to help  the growth of various sporting disciplines in the country. Most of our athletes  are self sponsored like judoka, Szandra Szogedi and teenage swimmer Kaya Forson.

Most countries that are doing well at the Rio Olympics put in place a long term plan by organising competitions for their athletes from time to time to prepare them adequately. Such countries even project the number of medals they could win and work towards them.

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The nation ought to invest in the other sporting events if we want to win medals. Countries who do well at the Olympics make the proper investment in the sport and set projections. For instance, Azerbaijan is doing so well in amateur boxing because the nation put in place a $10 million budget to help develop the sport and it reflected at the Rio Olympics.

Read more: Rio 2016

Where is Ghana's investment? For the those of short memory the already beleaguered sports budget for 2016 was cut by almost 45 percent.

Read more: Abdul Wahid Omar

Boxing was the first to put Ghana sports on the world map in 1964 Olympic Games and has produced three medals in all. If government had paid attention to it, we would have won additional medals.

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It is depressing to think there is a reward of $5000 to win a medal yet the same amount cannot be made available for a training tour before competitions.

Nobody resonates the depression better than the greatest boxer in Ghanaian history.

“You don’t help in the development of the athletes, and you expect them to win gold at the Olympics? It doesn’t happen like that. Other countries put in place programmes to develop the athletes; we can’t compare ourselves to them".

The blame should not be left at the door of only Government; the various sports federations under the National Sports Authority (NSA)  have also neglected their duties. Their inability to improve scouting,development and organise regular competitions of decent standards has also played a significant role.

Until Ghana sit up and set our priorities right regarding the development of sports in the country, we will always participate in the Olympic Games, without making any impact.

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