Highly motivated Black Stars after an impressive first half performance failed to keep up the momentum in the second half of the game.
A brilliant shot on target by Kudus Mohammed from a triangular Salis Mohammed’s pass in the 46′ minutes of the game got the opening goal for the Black Stars.
The dimension of the game totally changed when the pharaohs of Egypt came back strongly in the second half to equalize both goals scored by the stars through defensive lapses to draw the game 2-2.
Ghana coach Chris Hughton expressed frustration following Ghana’s 2-2 draw with Egypt in their second group game at the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations in Ivory Coast.
Despite leading twice, Ghana failed to hold on for the win, and Hughton believes his team deserved better.
“We will continue to fight,” Hughton said. “It’s true that there’s a lot of frustration in the locker room. Our team deserved more, but football is like that. It’s frustrating. With a similar performance, we would surely have won. Two errors cost us the match. We didn’t take this opportunity to take the three points.”
Williams had made an error leading to Egypt’s goal, and his replacement Osman also committed a similar error and couldn’t recover afterwards.
Hughton explained that Osman’s mistake was much concerning, the lad could not recover from his mistake which took a lot from him in the game, so need to re-substitute him after 15′ minutes of his introduction.
“Firstly, I would like to say that we love Osman,” Hughton said. “However, I had to take him out because his mistakes were starting to affect his performance.”
The Black Stars needs absolute victory against Mozambique to enhance their qualifications in the the second round.
“There are no more small teams in Africa,” Hughton said. “We are preparing for a tough match against them. The calculations are already made, we need a victory to pursue our dream and I know we are capable of it.”
Looking ahead to their next game against Mozambique, Hughton knows that his team needs a victory to advance to the tournament’s knockout stages. He acknowledges that it won’t be an easy task, but he’s confident that his team can rise to the challenge.