No Age Cheating Worries For Ghana at Africa U-17 Championship

Ghana have no fears about the ages of their players going into the 2013 African Under-17 championships this weekend. The Black Starlets participation in this age group competition has previously been blighted by talk of some of the players being over-aged. Ghana, who are overly serious about their reputation for this competition, have tested all their players ahead of the competition. The Ghana FA has put its vice-president Fred Crentsil in charge of the project to ensure that all the players presented by the country fall within the age category and must excel in the competition. CAF will conduct MRI age-testing examination on all participating teams one day before the tournament kicks-off. The scans of the bone density of wrists have been found to be accurate to within one percent for boys under the age 18. The practice was first introduced by the continental governing body at the 2011 tournament in Rwanda. Eight Gambian players failed that test. Last year, it directed all national associations to conduct the test ahead of qualifiers. Eighteen players from Nigeria and 10 from Ghana failed the test and were culled from their respective squads. The competition opens on Saturday afternoon with hosts Morocco taking on Gabon at the Mohamed V Stadium in Casablanca, with Tunisia to take the pitch against debutants Botswana immediately after. Nigeria and Ghana, with Africa�s most illustrious record in international youth football, will clash in the most anticipated match of the group phase in Marrakech on Sunday evening, after Ivory Coast and Congo-Brazzaville would have done battle at the same venue. The Black Starlets also play Congo on April 17 and Ivory Coast on April 20 in the group phase.