Former Black Stars deputy coach Maxwell Konadu, has said that the four-time African Champions, offered Portugal too much respect in their World Cup Group H opener.
Ghana suffered a 3:2 defeat against Cristiano Ronaldo’s Portugal in their opening match at the ongoing 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
Speaking in an interview with Kumasi-based Akoma FM, the Legon Cities gaffer, pointed out that, the Black Stars team respected their opponents ‘too much’ during the game.
“I think we did our best looking at our game plan. The system went well for us especially at the defensive area because the Portuguese were not creating dangerous moments in our area” said Konadu.
He added that : “We should have opened up earlier, we seem to have respected the Portuguese too much.
“We sat too deep at our defensive third and I agree with the technical team because the Portugal team have a lot of stars and opening up could have been costly.
“We should have opened up the game after finding the equaliser, For me, changing Kudus was a bit wrong but probably the coach might have had a special reason why he did that, I can only imagine it was due to the yellow card he picked up. Kudus was on top of his game and we should have kept him for a while in my opinion.
“But maybe the coaches will give us some better explanation as to why they made those substitutions.” Konadu concluded.