Black Stars’ coach begins preparations on Tuesday for his first qualifying campaign as Ghana coach in the 2013 African Nations Cup campaign.

On Saturday, 8 September, the Black Stars host the first leg against Malawi at the Accra Sports Stadium in the final round of qualifying as both nations bid to reach the finals in South Africa.

Appiah is hoping to get an intensive training participation from his 24-man squad called up for the game.

“All the players are assembling on Monday so hopefully, Tuesday, we will start all out till the match day,” the Black Stars coach said.

“Malawi is a very strong team. I have watched about two or three of their games and they have a very good team, they are doing well.”

The next 90 minutes in the first leg will influence greatly which side goes through to the tournament which will mark the last time that the Nations Cup will be held in even-number years as the competition switches to uneven-number years from 2013 to avoid every second tournament being staged in the same year as a World Cup.

Malawi might be 58 places behind Ghana on the Fifa ranking table but that stat plays no part in Kwesi Appiah's preparations as he aims to overcome the qualifying hurdle.

With two fixtures to come which will determine their place in the 2013 Nations Cup finals, Appiah insists there is very little margin for error.

“The most important thing is, we will let the players know that it’s a not a weak side or is not a team that anyone can underrate.

“And for that reason we will go in all out and make sure we get a win here to make things easier for us when we go for the return leg in Malawi,” Appiah added.


GBC/GFA