Black Stars assistant coach Roger De Sa has lifted the lid on the challenges Ghana’s technical team encountered during the 2026 FIFA World Cup, revealing they inherited a struggling squad and embarked on an intensive scouting mission across Europe before naming the final team.
De Sa joined Carlos Queiroz’s backroom staff after the Portuguese coach was appointed just weeks before the tournament following the departure of Otto Addo.
Despite having limited time to prepare, the new technical team guided Ghana to the knockout stage before the Black Stars bowed out after a defeat to Colombia in the Round of 32.
Reflecting on the experience during an interview on 947’s MSW, De Sa admitted that restoring confidence to a team on a poor run of form was their immediate priority.
“When you’re coaching, you’re always going to face different challenges, and for us the biggest one was taking over a team that had lost six matches in a row,” De Sa said.
“Our first objective was to change that mentality. We needed to build belief again and replace the losing mentality with a winning one.”
The South African coach also disclosed that selecting Ghana’s World Cup squad required weeks of extensive travel across Europe, where the coaching staff monitored eligible players in action for their respective clubs.
According to De Sa, he spent only a few days in Ghana before beginning an exhaustive scouting assignment that took him from country to country.
“I spent about three days in Accra before flying to Europe, where I travelled for four weeks from club to club and match to match, watching Ghanaian players whenever they were playing,” he explained.
“Sometimes I even watched training sessions. It was a massive mission to eventually narrow everything down to the final 26-man squad.”
He added that injuries to key players further complicated the selection process, forcing the technical team to make difficult decisions in the build-up to the tournament.
“The injuries created another challenge because we had to constantly reassess our plans,” he added.
Carlos Queiroz was appointed on a short-term four-month contract ahead of the World Cup, with his current deal expected to expire in August. His future remains uncertain as the Ghana Football Association continues its review of the Black Stars’ World Cup campaign.
Although Ghana’s tournament ended in the knockout stages, De Sa believes the technical team laid important foundations under difficult circumstances after taking charge only weeks before football’s biggest event.
