GLASGOW, Scotland — Ghana’s head boxing coach Ofori Asare has defended his technical team following a poor showing at the Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games, saying fans are too quick to blame coaches when the challenges run deeper.
Team Ghana sent 10 boxers to Scotland but managed just one medal — a bronze won by Amadu Mohammed in the men’s Bantamweight -55kg division.
Speaking at a post-tournament meeting attended by National Sports Authority Director General Yaw Ampofo Ankrah, Ghana Sports Fund Administrator Dr. David Kofi Wuaku, Ghana Boxing Federation President Dauda Fuseini, and the entire boxing team, Asare said the squad’s inexperience made achieving results difficult.
“It’s easy to blame the technical side because you see them very close to the athletes and so whenever there is a performance, you always point straight to the technical team but there are so many things that the technical team has to work on and being a technical person you are not a magician,”_ he said.
Asare pointed out that most of the team were debutants on the Commonwealth stage.
“You need to work practically where is necessary. For instance, when you look at this team that we have, it is only one person who has been to the Commonwealth Games before but all of them this is their first time, some even this is their first international tournament,” he explained.
“So you can’t expect them to be at some level where others who have been to the Commonwealth Games two, three times” are.
The coach cited the defeat of Precious Akai Nettey as an example of the gap in experience.
“The person, Marvin Clair of Mauritius, who beat Precious Akai Nettey was a person who has been to the Commonwealth Games three times already and he even it was. But how can you perform a magic to beat somebody who has been to the Olympic Games three times, the Commonwealth Games, and then all of a sudden you come in and then beat him?” Asare asked.
“I’m not saying it’s not possible but the point is there are so many factors also that we need to work on.”
Ghana’s boxing team arrived in Glasgow with high hopes but only Mohammed delivered, settling for bronze after a 4-1 points loss to Australia’s Jye Dixon in the semi-finals.
The result leaves Ghana with two medals at Glasgow 2026 — one silver and one bronze.
