Jet-lagged heroes: Ghana sprinters seal World Champs spots, criticise travel chaos
Ghana’s sprint stars have launched a stinging rebuke of the country’s sports authorities over what they describe as poor planning and inadequate support from authorities, revealing they competed under punishing travel conditions, despite delivering a qualification performance for the 2027 World Athletics Championships in Beijing.
The backlash follows what athletes have characterised as a disjointed and exhausting travel schedule to the Debswana World Athletics Relays in Gaborone, Botswana, where the national men’s 4x100 metres team defied the odds to book their place in Beijing.
Qualification secured
The national men’s 4x100 metres relay team, comprising Abdul-Rasheed Saminu, Benjamin Azamati, Joseph Amoah and Edwin Gadayi, defied fatigue and logistical setbacks to finish second in 38.09 seconds in the repechage round at the Debswana World Athletics Relays in Gaborone, Botswana, yesterday.
But the achievement has been overshadowed by sharp criticism from the athletes, led by Ghana’s fastest man Saminu, who publicly questioned the Sports and Recreation Ministry’s commitment to elite preparation.
Saminu, Ghana’s current 100m record holder, did not mince words in a strongly-worded post on X (formerly Twitter), drawing a sharp comparison with the treatment of the national football team.
“The Ministry of Sports in Ghana needs to do better; don’t set us up for failure. If it were ‘Black Stars’, flight tickets would be ready a month prior to their game,” he wrote.
“Fourteen hours flight, 16 hours layover is not acceptable for professional athletes. We’re running with jet lag, no proper recovery.”
Lack of support
Azamati, the former 100m national record holder who previously represent Ghana at the World Championships in Doha (2019), Eugene (2022) and Tokyo (2025), echoed similar concerns about the level of support and preparation afforded to the relay team, revealing the stark disadvantage Ghanaians athletes faced compared to their better-prepared rivals.
Despite the athletes’ frustration over the lack of structured support, their response on the tracks was emphatic. Having narrowly missed automatic qualification last Saturday, finishing fourth in the heats in 38.19 seconds, the quartet returned with renewed focus in yesterday’s ‘repechage’ (a second-chance competition for qualification spots).
Their baton exchanges were sharper, their transitions cleaner and their pace sustained across all four legs as they surged to a decisive second-place finish.
The result secures Ghana a place at the World Championships for the fourth time in the men’s 4x100m relay, underlining the team’s growing pedigree on the global stage.
