Black Stars head coach, Otto Addo, has urged his players to be ready to sacrifice and die for the country ahead of their crucial game against Uruguay which comes on Friday.

Ghana and Uruguay face off at the Al Janoub Stadium in Al Wakra with both sides in search of a win to make the Round of 16 stage.

Coach Otto Addo has demanded from his players to be ready to emulate Luis Suarez and sacrifice for their country when the need arises to ensure the team wins and qualifies.

Addo was making reference to Luiz Suarez handball incident at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa which denied Ghana a spot in the semi-finals as they were knocked out on penalties by the South American side.

According to him, he has no qualms with what Luiz Suarez did and has urged his players to also emulate that aspect of sacrifice in that match incident.

“It’s about perspective, if the same incident happened the other way around and Ghana had advanced to the semi-final, everybody would say it’s normal that a player would do everything he could to help his team advance to the semi-final.” “This is what I wish from every player to do all he can to help his team qualify or sometimes sacrifice even himself,” Otto Addo said at the pre-match conference.

Black Stars deputy captain, Thomas Partey who was also on pre-match talking duties, said the team will want to show the rest of the world what they are capable of despite being ranked the lowest team in the tournament.

“We want to show that we are capable of everything.” We were the lowest ranked team in the tournament, and we have to stick to that and also try and work harder to show that we are able to dominate games.
“It’s a different game; we have to stick to our plan, the plan of the coach and all the players need to understand what we want and want to achieve.”

“I was very young and playing colts in Ashiaman.” It was a game of football, and everything can happen. We had the chance to score the penalty, but we were unlucky that the ball didn’t go in. We know what we are going to do. “We are going into this game well prepared, we know what we have to do to be able to win , we have worked hard and will stay true to what coaches will expect from us,” he added.

Ghana is likely to face Brazil at the Round of 16 stage if they make it pass the next round.

From Herbert BOAKYE YIADOM, Doha, Qatar