Former Ghana captain Stephen Appiah says he could have ended up being in jail by now if not for football.
The ex- Juventus star began his football career at local club Accra Hearts of Oak in 1995, at 15 years of age.
Appiah, 40 has shared his experience on how he was persuaded by friends to commit crime during his youth days before entering into football.
According to him, football changed his life as he was influenced by friends to do some illegal things which could have landed him in jail if he was caught.
“If I followed my friends, I would be in jail right now. I used to sleep in abandoned cars and trucks and in the middle of the night they would wake me up to do bad things. My dream was to become a football player. Football enabled me not to be a gangster”.
Appiah who captained the Black Stars to their first-ever World Cup in 2006, featured for Accra Hearts of Oak Udinese, Parma, Brescia, Juventus, Fenerbache, Bologna, Cesena and Juventus during his playing days for almost two decades.
The intelligent midfielder was also part of Ghana’s squad that historically reached the quarter-finals of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
He made 64 caps and scored 14 goals for the Black Stars of Ghana.