When the names of Joseph Addo, Paul Aidoo, Faruk Adams, Anokye Badu, Emmanuel Akuoko, Amankwa Caleb, Justice Anane are written on paper the first thing that comes to mind is “What a quality defence” but the experience of Aduana Stars in the current Confederation Cup say a different story and for that matter a terrible different story.
The facts are that the Aduana defence, perhaps the most expensive defensive assembly in the country, has not kept a single clean sheet in four Confederation Cup games this year – a one nil defeat in Abidjan versus ASEC, a 3-3 home draw against Raja Casablanca, a 2-1 home win and a 2-0 away loss against AS Vita.
The most worrying aspect of it was that during Sunday’s game there was no sure bet defender you could point at the back of the Ogya side and so it was always dangerous any time the Vita players run at the defence of Kenichi Yatsuhashi. Whilst this defensive problem was present under Yusif Abubakar, Kenichi has also failed to correct things in the two games he’s been in charge.
This is a big concern especially when you look at the performance of some of the players named above at their former clubs. Somebody like Paul Aidoo was the best Medeama defender for good number of years but he’s not proven that in Dormaa and there are lot of games that back this point especially Sunday’s 2-0 loss against AS Vita. He was supposed to bring his Africa experience to the set up but that has not been the case. If Faruk fails, there is an excuse for a young player who’s playing in Africa for the first time but guys like Akuoko, Aidoo have no excuse to disappoint.
When the Dormaa side vowed to strengthen its defensive sector following the departure of Wahab Adams who left on free transfer to Kotoko, the arrival of Aidoo and Faruk gave the signal that the club was going to be even more stronger defensively than before. But is this the strengthening?
In the 3-3 draw against Raja, two of the Moroccan goals were avoidable goals if Aduana Stars had defended well and on Sunday the team conceded the opening Vita goal where the goalscorer was completely unmarked and had all the space available to him to head home the opener.
Four games, 6 goals conceded, no single clean sheet obtained are certainly not characteristics of an expert defence.
