Football Fables tells the story behind today’s Black Stars

Friday 2nd July, 2010. I’m in my 1980s Ghanaian replica football shirt. It has been hastily pulled over my work clothes. I’m in the kind diverse company you can find in most gentrified north London pubs now. Friends, colleagues and a few fellow Africans are scattered around. Others inform me that they too will be African for the next 90 minutes. How familiar, English people appropriating African things. (I don’t make this clumsy observation aloud now, but when I am drunk enough to do so I’m told to “Get over it”).  Still, we all contribute to the friendly chatter made by people interested, yet not entirely moved. By the end of the night, they will be.

I have not supported England since Euro ‘96. It was not a conscious decision on my part to abandon the national side. It was a deliberate decision for the national side to abandon me. To buy £200,000 watches, accumulate mostly awful women for wives and to put nasty body kits on beautiful cars they are privileged to own. I don’t care much for their tattoos either. I became disinterested. 

Asamoah Gyan celebrates the penalty that went in

It’s not just the personalities, English football has failed to thrill me over the past 15 years. The scandals of days gone by were typically English and typically fun.  They were fuelled mostly by team bonding and bad judgement, not viciousness or disregard. The Terry saga left a bitter taste in the mouth of many; the Gerrard story if it ever breaks is likely to do the same.  

So now, like many of us in the Diaspora, I tend to root for athletes of shared heritage or experience. The English can’t compete with their humility, passion and pride. I don’t mean this in a tokenistic, noble savage way. It’s an appreciation of worth, rather than entitlement. I urge you to watch this interview with Ghanaian international Dominic Adiyiah  – no moaning, no anger, no excuses. He gives only apologies, acceptance and understanding. 

I can understand Adiyiah, because I can know something of where he came from. In what seems like a lifetime ago (when Ghana played Australia) I attended a screening of Football Fables, a documentary about the Ghanaian youth football system, directed by Baff Akoto. Akoto, when asked, explained why he made the film: 

“I love football and I love Ghana.” 

This seems reason enough. 

Football Fables explores the journey of a young footballer with the 2008 African Cup of Nations, held in Ghana that year, as a backdrop to his story. We learn about Francis, his learned manager, and the limited opportunities available to him in his native country. 

The opening scene is filmed in the intimate setting of a crowded changing room. Young footballers clap, chant and sing together. This is not the Emirates Stadium. This is the Ghana U-20 international team, who avoided the ignominy of being knocked out of a knock-out competition and won the U-20 World Cup. (Most of the players graduated to play in South Africa this year). 

Akoto’s subject is an energetic talent desperate to make his living playing football. Francis has already had a trial with Reading and his manager meets with a German representative whose clubs want to see him train. It’s not simple; the clubs often do not pay travel or offer much in the way of compensation. The manager not only manages his starlet, he accommodates and employs him as well. The manager needs compensation too. He’s been in the game a long time and has no patience to suffer fools. The German, with nothing to offer but opportunity, is sent packing. 

In this lies the story Football Fables wants to tell; the journey that must be made and the people that must be encountered before a young Ghanaian prodigy can be successful. Whether it’s seedy, corrupt, unfair or unsurprising, the audience is left to judge. Akoto is happy to film the vibrancy and honesty that can be found in Ghana, whether in the street football played by youngsters to make money or the household in which Francis lives, complete with a younger brother that wishes to follow him everywhere, much to his annoyance. Francis washes cars and stacks shelves; all the while with consideration, thoroughness and, perhaps strangely to his peers in this country, great thanks. 

The youth football industry has little regulation, so boys have to take their chances where they find them. There is the charity youth set-up that scouts, recruits, trains and teaches young boys to a standard that makes them saleable. Some can be helped by a manager in the way that Francis is. The third chance they have is to be scouted by a hungry premier league talent hunter, and whisked away to glory. But each path handles the player in its own different ways. 

Via Ibrahim Sunday, an icon of the past, to Sulley Muntari, an icon of the present, we view the optimism, hard work and sacrifice that Francis must bear to move on. He lives far away from home (a common occurrence in young Ghanaian adulthood) and meets his obligation to send money to his family – more at Christmas. This is done in spite of the fact he can’t earn enough to make an independent living playing in the Premier League equivalent of his home. And in the meantime the one unquestionable thing is his faith in his manager to find him a club. He has found himself on this path; he cannot choose another one now. 

If anyone is confused or fascinated by the Ghanaian celebrations, the dignified silence after the undignified handball or belatedly frustrated with the excesses of the Premier League, watch this documentary when you can. You’ll see the country, you’ll see the desire but most of all, you’ll see young men. Not spoilt brats. 

Football Fables screening information can be found here: 

www.footballfables.co.uk

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