The sages who said history does repeat itself in football maybe damn right eighteen years ago ( 1992 to be precise )Ghana’s football legend Abedi Ayew Pele missed the chance of captaining the Black Stars for the first time in an African Cup final after picking a second yellow card  in the competition. The Black Stars struggled to a pulsating draw with Cote d’Ivoire after extra time and lost on penalties.

Come 2010 , and Abedi’s son Dede Ayew, the exciting midfield sensation, missed the chance of playing in the Black Stars’ first ever World Cup quarter final berth after picking two yellow cards in the competition. The Black Stars struggled to a pulsating draw with Uruguay after extra time and lost on penalties.

What an interesting coincidence. The slight difference in the two scenarios is that in the match against Cote d’Ivoire, the penalty shootout traveled the second round and Ghana lost 11-10 whilst in the match against Uruguay it was a straight 4-2 loss. Perhaps, you may want to add that Ghana could have won the match in extra time if Asamoah Gyan had not missed a last minute penalty award.

Asamoah Gyan’s miss that culminated in Ghana’s exit from South Africa 2010 will continue to be a talking point in Ghana’s football circles for a long time. There is a vocal school of thought that holds that the top striker should not have been the one to take that crucial decider because he had been weakened by the series of hard tackles in the match.

But those who argue it was one of those odd moments in football were proved right when Asamoah Gyan courageously took the first kick in the subsequent penalty shootout and scored beautifully.  The young man had scored twice from the spot in the series against Serbia and Australia and going by the maxim that you don’t unnecessarily change a winning side, I think he was the right choice to take that historic penalty.

All great footballers will tell you that it takes a lot of courage to take such kicks.  Italian legend Roberto Baggio shot miles over the bar the last penalty kick in the World Cup final against Brazil in 1994 that won the “Samba Senors” their 4th world title after 24 years.  Brazilian great penalty takers like Zico and Socrates have on occasions missed penalties. Both Spain and Paraguay threw away penalties in their nerve racking quarter final on Saturday evening before Spain got the match-winner to set a semi final date with hot favourites Germany.

Ghana’s performance in South Africa was a remarkable improvement over Germany 2006 and the general belief in the country is that with proper planning Ghana could be among the favourites in Brazil 2014.

Meanwhile I am delighted to be proved right that South Africa 2010 would be full of surprises. You will agree with me that from the group stages till the last four it has been upsets galore.  The early elimination of defending champions Italy, European champions Spain losing to Switzerland, Uruguay’s 3-0 win over hosts South Africa, Portugal’s 7-0 mauling of North Korea, Serbia’s 1-0 win over Germany, Australia beating Serbia, Germany whipping both England and Germany and Brazil being eclipsed by Holland are few of the many shocking results that will make South Africa 2010 a most memorable event.

My simple maxim is that Africa is a continent full of surprises, so South Africa 2010 was bound to shock the football world with a lot of unexpected results that makes competitive sports such an exciting spectacle anyway. The last two pairings in the medal zone- Germany against Spain and Holland versus Uruguay are hardly what the experts predicted and so your guess for the ultimate winner is as good as mine.

All I will say is cheers everybody and keep loving sports.