{"id":9116,"date":"2014-09-06T18:38:18","date_gmt":"2014-09-06T22:38:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/?p=9116"},"modified":"2014-09-14T00:26:34","modified_gmt":"2014-09-14T04:26:34","slug":"cranes-boost-afcon-dream-after-draw-with-the-black-stars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/9116","title":{"rendered":"Cranes boost AFCON dream after draw with the Black Stars"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"<\/a>Ghana were forced to come from behind to earn a 1-1 draw with Uganda in their opening Africa Cup of Nations qualifier on Saturday.<\/div>\n
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After a dismal World Cup,\u00a0riddled with off-field problems, Kwesi Appiah’s men made an unconvincing start to their qualifying campaign in Kumasi.<\/p>\n

Without Sulley Muntari and Kevin-Prince Boateng –\u00a0suspended indefinitely due to disciplinary problems –\u00a0the hosts toiled against their opponents, ranked 45 places below them in the world.<\/p>\n

After Tony Mawejje had given Uganda the lead at the end of the first half, Ghana were grateful to an award of a controversial penalty which Andre Ayew confidently dispatched as the hosts earned themselves a point.<\/p>\n

Ghana made the brighter start, and captain Asamoah Gyan was twice denied by fine saves from Uganda goalkeeper Denis Onyango.<\/p>\n

Those stops proved crucial on the stroke of half-time as Mawejje\u00a0gave the visitors the lead with a shot from the edge of the area that bounced awkwardly in front of Fatau Dauda and flew into the corner.<\/p>\n

Ghana reacted strongly at the start of the second half and were level in the 50th minute.<\/p>\n

Abdul Majeed Waris\u00a0was adjudged to have been felled inside the box and after protests from the Uganda players fell on deaf ears, Ayew\u00a0sent his spot-kick straight down the middle.<\/p>\n

Uganda almost retook the lead immediately, but Dauda tipped Brian Umony’s low effort onto the post.<\/p>\n

Although Ghana had much the better of the final half an hour, Appiah’s men were unable to force a winner and will now travel to Togo for their next Group E qualifier on Wednesday, while Uganda will host Guinea.<\/p>\n

(Photo)-Redpepper
\nSource: Sportal<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ghana were forced to come from behind to earn a 1-1 draw with Uganda in their opening Africa Cup of Nations qualifier on Saturday. After a dismal World Cup,\u00a0riddled with off-field problems, Kwesi Appiah’s men made an unconvincing start to…<\/span> Read more ›<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":72,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[44,46,1],"tags":[3897,3906,3919,3918,3911,3900,3905,3910,3899,3898,3907,3912,3901,3902,3916,3917,3920,3904,3493,3921,3908,3914,3903,3913,4975,3896,3909,3915,47],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9116"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/72"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9116"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9116\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}