Like many English football fans, I have a problem with the Milton Keynes Dons. I prefer to refer to them as Franchise FC because they stole their place in the Football League from another club and their fans. The owners of Franchise bought the club formerly known as Wimbledon FC and shipped it lock, stock and barrel to their new town in Buckinghamshire with no regard for the fans. Such a move might be acceptable in the world of North American sport where it isn't that unusual for a Baseball or Basketball club to move cities but that's because their sports tend to be based on a franchising model. No such model exists in football in England and so that should have been that. Shamefully, and despite franchising being forbidden, authorisation to proceed with the move was granted and the theft of Wimbledon FC went ahead. I have seen MK Dons (the new club) just once at their new stadium and that was, quite simply, to keep my 92 Club qualification up to date. I have not seen MK Dons since and I have no plans to do so. However, I will grudgingly admit that stadiummk is a very nice venue so, when I saw that this one-off International would be taking place there on a sunny day in June when there were no other matches being played, I decided to give stadiummk another go.
Ghana, the self-styled "Black Stars", dominated the match against inferior opponents as might have been expected. Portsmouth's Kevin-Prince Boateng was impressive in midfield in place of the injured superstar Michael Essien of Chelsea, who was destined to miss the World Cup due to ongoing knee problems. Ghana's man of the match was surely Kwadwo Asamoah of Udinese who caused problems for Latvia all afternoon. Indeed, Latvia would have lost by more than just a single goal had Asamoah Gyan brought his shooting boots. That single goal came in the 88th minute of the game and was converted by Quincy Owusu-Abeyie from long range.
At the World Cup which started just six days after today's featured game, Ghana found themselves in Group D and opened their campaign with a 1-0 victory over Serbia. Their second game ended as a 1-1 draw with Australia who had been hammered 4-0 by Germany in their opening game. Thus, in the final Group Stage games, Ghana could afford to lose to Germany just as long as the goal difference between themselves and Australia wasn't allowed to swing by more than four goals. In the end, the Germans did beat Ghana, but only by 1-0 and the Australians couldn't make up the goal difference despite beating Serbia 2-1. Ghana were through to the knockout phase and beat the United States 2-1 in the Round of 16 becoming only the third African side in history to reach the Quarter-Finals of a World Cup. Sadly in that Quarter-Final that they succumbed to Uruguay in a penalty shootout following a 1-1 draw. Ghana had had a last minute opportunity to win the game following a blatant goal line handball by Luis Suarez but Guan missed the spot kick and the game went straight to penalties. Ghana, managed by the Serb Milovan Rajevac, had nevertheless acquitted themselves well. Asamoah Gyan, who shortly after signed for Sunderland, had a fine World Cup despite that crucial penalty miss, scoring three goals.
CRB Match No. 1754
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