Australian Deaf Football side take on Ghana Deaf Football team in TPL curtain raiser
Ghana is currently the African Champions.
For the past 12 months Deaf Football Australia has been working very hard in trying to identify talented deaf players. Saad and Stanton have spent a considerable amount of time traveling looking for players that they believe need to be of a certain quality and playing at a certain level.
From the team that participated in the Greece World Championships last year only 6 players remain as Saad and Stanton have raised the bar considerably and have unearthed some new and exciting talent.
The Australian team that takes on Ghana is an untested team and the players and coaching staff are looking forward to the challenge ahead, as this will give the coaching staff a very good idea of where and what needs to be done to qualify for the next World Cup in 2012.
Saad indicated the preparation has not been that great due to the most of the players residing interstate. Financially it becomes quite expensive to fly players around, but the players know that Robert and I won?t tolerate unfit players in the squad, therefore if they are fit when they come into camp, then our job is made that much easier.
Deaf Football Australia would like to especially thank the Sydney Olympic board for allowing Deaf Football Australia to play the international match as a curtain raiser to the Sydney Olympic vs Sydney United 1st Grade match as well as supporting them throughout the football season each week.
A special thank you to Michael Quamby and his staff as well as the board of Football NSW for being the first state to really support Deaf Football Australia through football development opportunities.
The match against the Ghana clash kick’s off at 2.30pm at Belmore Sports Ground.
The Deaf Football Australian squad for the Ghana clash is as follows:
Marc Valante, Mack Davis, Jamie Flanagan, Mohammed Aber, Oliver Petkoski, Tony Tran, Joshua Doe, Nicholas Fonti, Mark Theodossiou, Johnathan Mahimarajan, Anthony Hinton, Christopher Vassilopoulos, Shane Marr, Paul Marr, Craig King, Brad Schofield, Dimitrios Psathas, Stephen Maher, Fayaz Meghani
