Ghana vs Uruguay feud explained: Luis Suarez’s handball and one of the World Cup’s most bitter rivalries
Otto Addo might be the one man in Ghana who is not out for revenge in Friday’s highly anticipated reunion with Luis Suarez.
Win against Uruguay and they are through to the last 16 of the World Cup, but it is a tie laced with symbolic retribution 12 years on from Suarez’s infamous handball that stopped the Black Stars from becoming the first African country in history to reach the semi-final of a World Cup.
After goals from Sulley Muntari and Diego Forlan had taken the 2010 quarter-final to extra time, the tie had reached the dying seconds when Suarez deliberately handled Dominic Adiyiah’s header on the goal-line.
The striker was promptly sent off, but celebrated wildly by the touchline as Asamoah Gyan crashed the resulting spot-kick off the crossbar. Uruguay went on to win 4-2 on penalties, and Suarez’s reputation was forged forever.
“I’m a guy who doesn’t think too much in the past when this incident happened,” Addo, Ghana’s head coach, said. “I’m a strong believer if you don’t seek revenge, you get even more blessings.”
Perhaps Addo has been able to move on as he stopped playing for his country in 2006 and did not become their manager until earlier this year. Others have found it more tricky to forgive and forget, including a reporter at the pre-match press conference in which Uruguay, rather mischievously, put Suarez forward as their nominated player to face the media.
“Some Ghana fans feel you are the devil itself. They are looking forward to retiring you,” Suarez was told by one Ghanaian journalist. An apology, however, was not forthcoming.
“Ghana’s player missed a penalty, not me,” was Suarez’s response. “Maybe I can apologise if I tackled and injured a player. It’s not my fault, I didn’t miss the penalty.”
Midfielder Anthony Annan, who played the full 90 minutes and extra time during that infamous meeting in 2010, was less accusatory towards Suarez than his compatriot from the media, but admits that the people of Ghana “don’t like to even hear his name mentioned”.
“He did it to save his country, that’s how I would put it,” Annan tells i philosophically. “Maybe if we had converted the penalty it would have been a different story altogether. When we went to the hotel and I saw the replay and he was celebrating after we missed… [starts laughing].
“You could see the sadness in our faces and some of us… it was like we couldn’t take it. It was like ‘how did this happen?’ We had the ball in our hands and we let it go. Some players were crying. It was heartbreaking and difficult to take. It affected us all when we got back to the dressing room and the hotel. I hope it doesn’t happen again because I’ve experienced this situation and it’s very hard to deal with that.”
Annan pauses as he is asked whether he would have done the same. “It’s difficult to say. Maybe yes, maybe. But I don’t see myself being there [on the line], I don’t know how he got there, maybe he just found himself [on the goal line]. For me, maybe I would have used my head, and maybe it would have gone in! But I don’t think it would come to my mind that I’d have to use my hands because I wasn’t the goalkeeper! But he did it and saved his country in the end.
Annan in action against Uruguay back in 2010 (Photo: Getty)
“We have to do something to redeem our image. I’d call it a revenge because they [the players] know. Even though they didn’t take part in 2010, they heard it so it’s a kind of revenge. They have to try to win to put all the doubts and everything behind us and we can forget about Uruguay.
“It’s a heavy duty, they have to lift the flag of Ghana very high. I hope and pray that we win, but I know that it’s going to be a very difficult game. We have to win to put a smile on the faces of Ghanaians this time around, to beat Uruguay.”
Andre Ayew, who is the only survivor from that team, insists “there’s no point in talking too much” about the Suarez incident, especially as the current Ghana side need just a point to progress.
Yet for many of their supporters, it is impossible to see Uruguay as just another opponent.
“Suarez is not forgiven and never will be for cheating us,” Ghana fan Nick Clerk tells i. “Memories of the match are pain, anger and disappointment as history was taken from us. If Ghana defend properly like in the first halves of our first two games then we have a chance. The players should be up for the fight. Mohammed Kudus should bring the magic.”
For Stephanie Okumi, another Black Stars fanatic, it is not only a chance to “get back at Uruguay for what they did in 2010,” but to give the nation “time to shine on the world stage again”.
This time, at least, the odds are slimmer. Tottenham midfielder Rodrigo Bentancur has been Uruguay’s engine, but they are yet to score at this World Cup, with Suarez – now 35 – only starting on the bench against Portugal.
Unrepentant Suarez insists Ghana’s players would have done the same thing
By Kevin Garside, i‘s chief sports correspondent
DOHA — Luis Saurez, or El Diablo as he is known in Ghana, is returned by fate to a fixture that first cast him as a pantomime villain. The handball to deny Ghana a certain goal and progress to the semi-finals in South Africa in 2010 proved a taster for more sinister habits that would later reveal something of his essence.
Twelve years on Suarez remains unrepentant about his goal-line swat with the scores level in extra time. Asamoah Gyan stepped up to take the penalty that would have guaranteed an African presence in a World Cup semi-final for the first time and sent it skimming off the bar. Suarez watched red carded from the touchline, whirling about in uncontainable mirth at the outcome. Ghana would miss twice more in the shootout to send Uruguay through.
As well as being told by a Ghanaian reporter that the Black Stars fans were looking forward to retiring him at the Al Janoub Stadium, Suarez was asked if he had ever thought about saying sorry for that episode. The reply reinforced his diabolic reputation.
“I don’t apologise about that. The Ghana player missed the penalty not me. Maybe I can apologise if injure a player and take a red card. In this situation I take a red. The missed penalty is not my fault. That is not my responsibility. Besides some of the players now were what, eight years old then? If you ask any player they will say they would do the same thing.”
He may or may not have a point. What is indubitable is the case against Suarez for the lunacy that followed, three bites in four years that left an indelible imprint on his career if not his victims. In November 2010 he was banned for seven games and labelled the ‘Cannibal of Ajax’ for sinking his teeth into the shoulder of PSV’s Otman Bakkal.
Suarez spoke to the media ahead of the rematch with Ghana (Photo: AFP)
Three years later whilst at Liverpool he received a 10-game sanction for taking a chunk out of the arm of Chelsea’s Branislov Ivanovic. And then on the highest stage of all in 2014 he went for Italy’s Giorgo Chiellini in the final group game won by Uruguay to take them to the last 16. Suarez escaped punishment during the match but was subsequently banned for four months.
For that last transgression he did at least accept responsibility, admitting he made a mistake and shook hands with his victim. Chiellini accepted the apology and subsequently declared his admiration for Suarez in his autobiography. Redemption, at least in the eyes of his opponents, appears off the table in the final group game with Ghana, a match that Uruguay must win to have a chance of progressing. Suarez has yet to start a game in this tournament but declared himself ready to get stuck in, as it were.
“My pace is not what it used to be,” he said. “In my situation you have to help the team with skills, intelligence, and movement. I can’t just play a long ball and run for 30 metres. There are others who can do that. I did that in the past. This is my World Cup.”
Suarez accepted the parlous nature of Uruguay’s position, bottom of Group H with an inferior goal difference to South Korea of one. “I would have loved to be in a different situation. It upsets me to be in this situation. But we have good enough players. What reassures me is that we rise to the challenge.
“As players we can always make excuses. We can all say something on Twitter, but we have to show our skills on the pitch. It’s about taking responsibility for what it means to be here with the national team and going for all out victory.”
Suarez has described Friday’s game as “do or die” and called Ghana a “good team, but we know them, we have beaten them before and we know how to beat them again.” He stopped short of reflecting on that unforgettable night in South Africa any further.
“I remember it like it was yesterday,” Ghana fan Boaz Quartey recalls. “I was on a boat party and was listening to the game on a small radio I smuggled on and was listening with earphones. I literally cried into the River Thames when we lost.
“I should forgive Suarez by now but I still haven’t. It doesn’t help I’m a Chelsea fan and still remember when he took a bite out of Branislav Ivanovic’s arm. But that day, I will never forget what he did.
“If I had to be honest, I’m not too confident Ghana will get revenge. I think we have a strong team, it will be a difficult game and a draw is most likely, but if we win I will feel a sense of vindication.”
Anthony Annan (left) played the full game against Uruguay in 2010 (Photo: Getty)
Ghana’s task is more arduous now that their golden generation of Gyan, Muntari, Kevin Prince-Boateng and Stephen Appiah has moved on. Without victory over their tormentors from more than a decade ago, though, it will be hard for Ghanaians to do the same.
“I felt so proud of the Black Stars, Ghana progressing would have been so special as an African team playing at a World Cup hosted by another African country,” Clerk adds. “I’m not ashamed to admit I cried that evening. Occasionally, I come across the clip of the handball and Gyan’s missed penalty and have to scroll past it as quickly as possible, I still can’t bring myself to watch the replay, even after all these years.
“I don’t think any other football moment has caused me greater heartbreak, although supporting Arsenal has brought me close. I think I can speak for our nation when I say Ghanaians still haven’t fully healed.
“If we come away from this tournament with anything at all, it has to be a win against Uruguay. This match is due to be iconic for all the right reasons this time. We all know how much it will mean to the players and they’ll have a different kind of fire in their bellies. Who doesn’t love poetic justice?”
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