Ghana beat New Zealand 1-0 to exit the 2018 Fifa U-20 Women’s World Cup on a high Sunday afternoon.
The Black Princesses looked sharper, more composed and determined as Ruth Anima snatched the win late on at Stade Guy-Piriou in Concarneau.
Ghana created chances through captain Sandra Owusu-Ansah and Anima but the striking pair fired blanks in the opening half. New Zealand on the other hand were wasteful upfront as they created some decent scoring opportunities.
Coach Yusif Basigi’s girls continued their dominance in the second half and finally landed the only goal of the encounter in the 75th minute. Player of the match winner Grace Asantewa initially rattled the bar with a shot from outside the box before Ruth Anima followed up with a header on a rebound into an empty net.
‘Ghana ended well’
Though knowing they couldn’t qualify whatever the outcome of the match, head coach Basigi says the Princesses resolved to not go home empty handed.
“I will say we didn’t start well but we ended well. This is actually the team that I used to know. We didn’t want to go home empty handed so we decided that we must come all out to get the three points,” he said after the match.
“It is a big achievement I think because I’m not going home with empty hands. I have to congratulate my girls because they’ve done marvelously well and adhered to what I was telling them.
The future is bright for us if we put our things together,” Basigi added.
Ghana’s campaign at the Fifa U-20 Women’s World Cup France 2018 ended with a third place finish in Group A – after initial 4-1 and 4-0 defeats to hosts France and Netherlands respectively.
