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The General Secretary of the Ghana Football Association, Prosper Harrison Addo has advised football club administrators to stop making loose arrangements with players and develop the professional habit of signing legally-binding contracts with talents they wish to retain.

“The key actors in football are the players,” Mr. Addo said. “When you identify a talent, make sure you sign a contract.”

He cited instances where clubs spend valuable resources to groom players but fail to sign contracts with them, making it easy for the players to leave with no return on the clubs’ investments.

Mr. Addo was speaking at a mentorship training programme organized by Betway in partnership with the Ghana Women’s Premier League. It was the first of a series of seminars being sponsored by Betway as part of the company’s role as a development partner for the Ghana Women’s Premier League.

The capacity-building programme was held simultaneously in Kumasi and Accra with video links making it possible for participants, mainly women’s football administrators, to interact with the facilitators from Ghana and South Africa.

Director of National Teams at the GFA, Alex Asante urged football administrators to ensure all the needs of their players are met to enable them deliver their best. He mentioned that for women’s football especially, there is a need to be in touch with guardians, friends and others who may be close to the players to enable them spot and deal quickly with issues that may affect player performance.

Mr. Asante also advised team managers to work hard to develop better relationships with their players.

“If you don’t relate to players well, it will be difficult to earn their respect,” he said. “Player relation is very important.”

Chief Executive Officer of Forwardzone, Ashley Kotzin urged the club administrators to identify and build on their leadership skills.

Warren Engelbretcht, a leader in sports science and high performance, took participants through a session on analyzing various styles of leadership

Director of IT at the Ghana Football Association (GFA), Francis Adu, in his presentation on Football and Information and Technology urged team managers to register players on the GFA’s Competition Management Systems before the start of the league season.