The Black Princesses head into their second group match against South Korea on Wednesday with little room for error after suffering defeat to Ecuador in their opening game.
Head coach Charles Sampson says the Ghanaian players have recovered from the disappointment and are ready to fight for the victory needed to revive their hopes of reaching the knockout stage.
Sampson said a positive training session had helped the squad put the emotional impact of the Ecuador defeat behind them as they prepare for the crucial encounter on September 9, 2026.
“Our training was good, thank God. Now I can say confidently that the girls have come over the last game’s shocker and the emotions in it. So now we are ready to go,” he said.
The coach believes greater confidence in front of goal could be decisive against South Korea, with the team using training sessions to sharpen its performance in the final third.
“We have always been good to go. We work on the final third almost all the time. We just need to give them more confidence in it,” Sampson said.
He acknowledged that Ghana failed to produce the level of football expected of them against Ecuador, describing the opening match as an unusual performance in which things that normally came naturally to the team did not work.
“I would just say the first game was a very weird game. Weird in many senses, that what we normally do with ease was not really working and it can also be so many factors, difficult to pinpoint,” he explained.
Despite the setback, Sampson remains confident in the character of his squad and believes the players can respond positively under pressure.
“But as a team and with the sort of character we have in the team here, this is a challenge that we will handle well,” he said.
The coach admitted that the defeat had initially affected both the players and the technical team, but insisted that the squad had regained its focus ahead of Wednesday’s encounter.
“The girls were all down, just like myself on the first day, but we have shaken it off and now we are ready to go and redeem ourselves,” he added.
Ghana now needs a strong response against South Korea to keep its knockout-stage ambitions alive. A victory would provide the Black Princesses with maximum points and put them in a stronger position ahead of their remaining group fixture.
Sampson is consequently counting on the work done in training, particularly in the final third, to produce a more clinical and confident attacking display.
With the pressure mounting after the opening defeat, the Black Princesses will be looking to turn their disappointment into motivation and secure the result required to remain in contention for the next stage.
