Otto Addo on defending set pieces, Inaki Williams, Thomas Partey and Nicaragua: Transcript

Coach Otto Addo has been sharing his thoughts on Ghana’s 3-0 defeat to Brazil and the next game against Nicaragua on Tuesday, September 27, 2022. The former Ghana midfielder will head into his 8th game as Ghana Coach with an aim of securing all the spoils against the North American country to get his side back on track as preparations for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 continues.

The Black Stars were humbled 3-0 by Brazil in Le Harve and with only two games to play before the finals; Otto Addo expects an improvement from his men this time. In this interview he tells us about the integration of Inaki Williams, defending set pieces, expectations, the absence of Thomas Partey and many more.

Read on for the full transcript:

On expectations from the team after defeat to Brazil

It’s another good test match for us, just to find each other the patterns, prime connections and we are happy to be here to play an opponent like Nicaragua. We hopefully can try a lot things, I don’t think it will be as tough as the match against Brazil but it’s a different tough opponent because they have proved in previous games that they can harm other teams so it’s going to be interesting.

On Alexander Djiku

Djiku has a little pain so he went to the Doctor for checkup so we have to wait for the results.

On Tariq

He felt something during the warm up so we said we have to watch out and do a little management and he will be assessed later after training. I hope that it’s nothing serious and hope that he can play tomorrow.

Key objectives going into the game against Nicaragua

Like I said to have a lot of connections, it’s a different game, this game we are the favorites so it demands different things from us. We have trained; we talked about it in the last days and hopefully we can see a lot of, especially offensive patterns in that game.

On starting players who didn’t feature against Brazil

This one we will decide this evening, we will see.

On starting players who came to perform against Brazil

I don’t know, like I said it’s a different match for everyone to know. For me I can ring over a team and play against the next team. But every team demands different things so I need to pick the players which I need for that game. Even though somebody may have scored three goals in one game doesn’t mean he has to play in the other game. Because the games and the teams or opponents are different and so different demands for each game this I have to bring players.

On defending set pieces

We had some useful discussions about set pieces. Yesterday we trained them again and we hope that we improve in that and we don’t concede goals anymore like that.

On media and fan reaction after Brazil defeat

We are using these matches to try a lot of things, not only on the players but also for my side on systems so we have to find that together, this is very important for us as a team. We have new players in each unit to integrate and a whole a lot of things and also what to use these games for everyone to show themselves at the training and also in the games and I am not worried. We have to take the right conclusions out of every match and prepare ourselves for the World Cup.

On Inaki Williams

He has been very, very good, he integrated very well, and he gets along with a lot of players. From what I see, also in the game he adapted very well. I saw a lot of things which I want to see and I am happy for him to be here and we are very, very happy to have him in our team.

On having Inaki and Nico playing for Ghana one day

That would have been great but his brother decided to play for Spain which is fair and respected as well. We would have loved to see him Ghana but I can understand this. I was also born in Germany and grew up in Germany so you also have two homes in your heart so this is always a difficult decision so we respect that; hopefully it would great if we could play against Spain.

On absence of Thomas Partey

With the tactics it doesn’t affect a lot because tactics involve style of play and players with such abilities so I think tomorrow’s game we will be okay. Hopefully Thomas will be healthy very, very soon. We didn’t want to take that risk in a friendly game to play him against Brazil but surely playing a player like him against a squad like Brazil would have been helpful.

Ghana will play the Central American country at Estadio Francisco Artés Carrasco in Lorca on Tuesday, September 27, 2022as part of Ghana’s preparation towards the FIFA World Cup finals in Qatar.

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