The Black stars team will not change overnight. If you have followed football for sometime, you know that. A new coach can make some flash changes as he takes over the team, but to ingrain his football philosophy and style may take sometime.
Somehow, every country have a culture of how they play their football which makes them produce some certain kind of players in general. Ghana produces more midfielders, while Nigeria produces more attackers. I may not tell why here, that's a topic for another time.
With my knowledge of football analytics, I have researched the current squad of Ghana senior men's national team (Black Stars) from 2021 till date and calculating their stats this is what I found.
Ghana Black Stars Current Stats
Defensive = 35%
Offensive = 33%
Ball Retrieval Ratio (BRR) = 39%
Total Pass Completed (TPC) = 64%
Total Shot Ratio (TSR) = 25%
Expected goals (ExG) = 18%
Team Concentration level (TCL) = 25%
Preferred Team Formation (PTF) = 4-4-2 or 4-3-3
Alright, these stats may not be absolute, they are based on the information I gathered and my limited knowledge in the use of the Wyscout platform, but they play a great role in understanding the structure of a team, building a strategy, scouting opponent's strength and weakness, and evaluating individual players in the opponent team.
Analysing the Stats
1. Ghana Has Good ball Holding and Passing Skills, But Poor Offensive Penetrations and Very Wasteful Upfront.
Analysing the stats above you can rate the current black stars as a little less than an average team. No disrespect, the Ghana team hold the ball well and complete 64% passes, but that doesn't translate to good offensive moves which is about 33%. It may also mean that their strikers are so wasteful in front of goal post.
2. Ghana Has Poor Ball Winning Skills, Put So Much Pressure on the Defense line
There ball retrieval ratio is also 39% which means the midfielders do not win the ball so well and put a lot of pressure on the defense line. The team defensive ability is about 35% that may mean the team may not be able to play a defensive formation so well. If you also consider that the team concentration level is also low 25%.
3. Ghana Fighting Spirit is Low and May Find it Difficult to Come Back when Loosing
Another thing you may know according to the stats is, if the Super Eagles team, referee or fans incites the Ghanaian team in anyway, they may loose concentration. It also shows that the team ability to fight back and come back into the game when they are loosing is also very low. They may need a lot of motivation from their home fans and managers.
Formation Prediction
The black stars are likely to play 4-3-3 or 4-4-2 formation, because it is natural that they want to win by scoring a lot of goals at home during the first leg.
My Recommended Strategy For Super Eagles of Nigeria
I deliberately decided not to compare Ghana Stats with that of Nigeria for some personal reasons not to expose the eagles to their opponent.
Ghana black stars have their strength in the midfield and that is where Nigeria has their greatest weakness.
It will be counter productive if Nigeria decides to play defensive formation, because they are playing at away. Of course, from Nigeria stats they are not also do good at playing defensive game plan.
The Super Eagles should plan to put the Ghanaian defense line under hyper pressure from the first blast of the whistle. The Nigeria side must find away to bypass the midfield by quick and speedy connection to the attackers via long passes and wing play. If they can exert such on the Ghanaian, their defense line may crumble 10 minutes into the game. The rest of the game will be in favour of Super Eagles.
