A week last Saturday Dan ‘phoned. Agnieszka, one of our volunteers in the Upper East was staying in Accra and had found tickets for the Grand Finale of the Africa Cup. Within 24 hours we were in Accra and on our way to the game. With a largely Ghanaian crowd, the atmosphere was less tense than it would have been had Ghana been playing, but there was a party mood. The Egyptian fans were to our right and before the game started some of them brought a banner round with a thank you message to their Ghanaian hosts. We had seats behind the Cameroon goal for the first half and were in a good position to see the keeper stop the Pharaohs from scoring. In the second half and at the other end of the pitch, he was unable to prevent Egypt from producing the only goal of the match and winning the tournament for a record sixth time. The President of Ghana presented the trophy and there was a final firework display before we left the stadium.
I don’t expect to be writing about football again while I am in Ghana. The tournament saw some excellent matches in some excellent facilities. Ghana, though disappointed not to have won, has much to be proud of in its handling of the event. A week on football fever has died away. George W. Bush has just stepped off Air Force One as I write for a 36 hour visit and talk has begun to return to the other big Ghanaian event of 2008 – the presidential election in its final days. The next Africa Cup will be in Angola in 2010. I hope it will not be overshadowed, later in the year when South Africa hosts the first World Cup to be held in Africa.