World Cup Royalty

10 August 2007

Members of staff from the University of Hull are bound for World Cup glory following their inauguration to the national Ghanaian women’s football team, the Black Queens.

The University’s Football Development Manager, Graham Potter, will join the squad as Technical Director, providing extensive knowledge and coaching to the team in their quest for the Women’s World Cup. 

He is joining the squad on 13th August for their Olympic qualifying game against South Africa in Johannesburg, before flying to China where the Black Queens will play Norway, Australia and Canada in the first round of the Cup. It is the first time that somebody from outside Ghana has been invited to be a part of the technical team.

Graham will be providing input to technical and tactical training programmes, match preparation and team selection. Members of staff from the Sports Science department are also joining the team, providing specialist support, including injury prevention, endurance training and acclimatisation. Graham will work closely with them and Ghana’s existing coaching team to ensure the Queens are as prepared tactically, technically and physically as they can be.

It’s the latest development in a strong relationship between the Ghanaian Football Association and the University of Hull. The Black Queens chose the University of Hull as their training camp and visited earlier this year, their first trip to the UK. The University’s impressive training facilities, such as the £1million 3G football pitches and the newly-equipped sports centre, were just part of the attraction for the Ghana ladies, alongside the wealth of sport and fitness expertise amongst the staff. During their stay, they received nutritional advice and individually-prescribed physical conditioning programmes for the first time in the team’s history.

The University is a headline sponsor of the team for their World Cup campaign. Graham said, “I am very excited about this opportunity, to be involved in a World Cup, and an Olympic-qualifying campaign is a tremendous honour for me and the University, and I'm really looking forward to the challenge. This has come about as a result of the hard work put in by the International Office, the University of Hull’s Student Union and the Department for Sport Health and Exercise Science in developing relations with the Ghanaian FA. The opportunity at this stage of my coaching career will give me valuable experience, which I hope will benefit myself and the University immensely.”