The former Ghana captain believes the absence of seven key players from the Black Stars squad will not affect his game plan against South Africa on Monday.
The Black Stars will play as visitors to the Bafana Bafana of South Africa in matchday 2 of the qualifiers at the FnB stadium.
Ghana are on top of Group G following a narrow 1-0 win over Ethiopia in Cape Coast last Friday with the host and Zimbabwe having a point each due to their stalemate last Friday.
Charles Akonnor traveled with a 26-man squad for the trip leaving out the players from England and Germany who could not join the team.
The team jetted off to Johannesburg without the English and German-based nationals because South Africa is placed on the COVID-19 red list of the aforementioned countries since they will have to isolate for 10 days when they return to their respective clubs.
The players left out of the squad include Daniel Amartey, Jordan Ayew, Jeffrey Schlupp, Andy Yiadom, Baba Rahman, Braydon Manu and Daniel Kofi Kyereh and also Kamaldeen Sulemana.
Speaking at the pre-match conference, Akonnor maintained the absence of the seven players who would have started for the Black Stars against South Africa won’t affect the team since they knew the situation at hand and prepared towards it.
“Because we were aware of the situation so we are well prepared. We knew that the English players might not come here with us because of Covid situation here and so we were prepared by way of coming here. We knew exactly what will happen so is not going to be a complain” he said.
After missing the 2018 event in Russia, Ghana has set their sights on returning to the World Cup next year in Qatar.
