For the third consecutive Olympics Ghana entered three sports disciplines, soccer, boxing and athletics. Once again it was boxing that gave Ghana a medal - thanks to Prince Amartey’s bronze when he lost in the semi-finals.

Fighting in the middleweight division Prince Amartey started punching his way to stardom with an excellent victory over Espionisa of Mexico after drawing a bye in the first round.

With excellent footwork coupled with telling punches Prince succeeded in disposing of the tough Mexican. His next victory, a bruising points’ decision over Denmark’s Poul Knutsen was enough to take him to the medal zone. Amartey opened each round with a flurry of punches that unsettled the Danish boxer.

Amartey’s semi-final encounter against Viertaman of Finland was extremely exciting. He scored repeatedly with left and right combinations which kept the Finn on the ropes throughout and it was surprising that he was declared loser

Apart from bantamweight Joe Destimo who won one fight by out-pointing Werner Schaefer of West Germany the remaining four boxers were all eliminated in the first round.

Joe Destimo lost his second fight to Indonesian southpaw Ferry Moniaga

Featherweight Joe Cofie was out-pointed by Cuban Orlando Palacois.

Light welterweight Odartey Lawson suffered a third round technical knockout loss to Isaka Daborg of Nigeria. The referee stopped the fight.

Welterweight Flash Emma was out-pointed by Dambinjar Bandi of Mongolia.

Light-middleweight Ricky Barnor was out-pointed by Cuban Roland Garbey.

Athletics

The athletics contingent was made up of J.A.Addy, George Daniels, Sandy Osei Agyeman, Ohene Karikari- sprints relay; Mike Ahey, Joshua Owusu-long jump; Sam Bugri-400m;J.O.Amoah, M.A.Pomaney- triple jump; Billy Fordjour-1,500m; Robert Hackman -3,000 steeple chase; Alice Anum and Hannah Afriyie (women’s sprints), Julian Ohemeng- 800m and 1,500m

Although Ghana did not win any medal, long jumper Joshua Owusu and sprinter Alice Anum were quite outstanding.

Joshua placed 4th in the long jump final and narrowly missed what would have been Ghana’s first Olympic medal in track and field. His leap of 8.01 m equaled the distance credited to the bronze medalist who made the jump once as against Joshua’s three attempts.

Alice Anum became the first Ghanaian athlete to qualify for the finals in both 100m and 200m placing 6th and 7th respectively. She clocked 11.4 secs in the 100m and 22.9 secs in the 200m.

Other notable performances in athletics were; Sandy Osei Agyeman won first 100m heats in 10.5secs; George Daniels 4th in 100m heats clocking 10.5 secs; Hannah Afriyie 12.4 secs in 100m heats and 7th in 200mthird round heats in 24.4 secs.

Football

The football contingent to the Games was made up of the following Essel Mensah, Lante France,(goalkeepers);Edward Boye,Oliver Acquah, Alex Mingle, John Eshun,Clifford Odame(defenders),Joe Ghartey,Ibrahim Sunday, Akuetteh Armah,(midfielders); Osei Kofi, Kwasi Owusu, Albert Essuman, Abukari Gariba, Yaw Sam, Malik Jabir, Peter Lamptey.

The team put up a disastrous performance losing all three matches in group four. Ghana was thrashed 4-0 by German Democratic Republic in the first match, another 4-0 by Poland and 3-1 by Colombia.

The first match was played a few hours after the opening ceremony of the Games at the giant Olympic Stadium in Munich. In view of the political differences between East Germany and West Germany at the time the largely West German crowd rooted for Ghana. Backed by this massive support Ghana attacked ferociously but Abukari and Kwasi Owusu missed a couple of close chances.

Then the East Germans took over and shot into the lead in the 19th minute through centre forward Kreische who beat Essel Mensah in the posts with a beautiful header.

Kreische again made it 2-0 just before recess. Sparwasser increased the tally to 3-0inthe 66th minute and Kreische got his personal hat-trick for the German Democratic Republic in the 89th minute

Ghana; Essel Mensah, Akuetteh Armah, Oliver Acquah, Al;ex Mingle,John Eshun(captain),Sunday Ibrahim,Osei Kofi/ Peter lamptey,Yaw Sam, Abukari Gariba,Kwasi Owusu Malik Jabir.

In the second match played in Regensburg, about 200km north of Munich,Poland thrashed Ghana 4-0 in a real one sided encounter, Inside left Maszczyk scored first in the 31st minute to give Poland a 1-0 half time lead. The Polish went on the rampage in the second half and speedy left winger Gadocha made it 2-0 in the 59th minute.

This goal completely took everything out of the Black Stars. Both the attack and defence crumbled. Poland scored twice in the last five minutes through forward Deyces and Gadocha to complete the rout.

Ghana line -up; Essel Mensah, Edward Boye,/Clifford Odame,Oliver Acquah,Alex Mingle,John Eshun, Joe Ghartey,Peter Lamptey, Yaw Sam, Abukari Gariba, Sunday Ibrahim, Malik Jabir

Ghana returned to Munich and lost the third match 3-1 to less fancied Colombia. After an exciting goalless first half Colombia took the lead in the 56th minute through centre forward Jaime Moren.. Wing half angel Torres made it 2-0 with a header four minutes later. Ibrahim Sunday pulled one back in the 79th minute but Louis Montaro got a third for Colombia three minutes later.

PS: The Munich Olympics were nearly marred by the killing of 11 Israeli athletes at the Games village by Palestinian bandits.

It was my first Olympiad and I will later on give readers my first experiences at the biggest sports festival on the planet.