How many times have we not been told about how competitive the Ghana Premier League is? How many times have we not heard about how attractive our league is? And how many times have the FA officials not waxed lyrical about the quality of our local game? But right now it has become conspicuously clear that all those claims were just knee-jerk reactions. For all the defence they put up for the league, it is obvious they never meant it. And for all the tirade launched against the doubters and outgoing Youth and Sports Minister, Nii Lante Vanderpuije, now it looks like he could be right after all.

The squad selection process for the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations in Gabon presented the perfect opportunity for the technical handlers of the Black Stars to put all arguments of a deliberate attempt to ignore home-based players to bed. But in the aftermath of the squad release, only two notions could be conceived: it is either the GPL is as poor as the detractors have always held, or the Black Stars hierarchy see nothing good in the league. The former is definitely debatable but the latter – with Avram Grant’s latest squad pick – suggests so.

“If I can give them [local-based players] advice, sometimes it’s better to stay in the league in Ghana for one or two more years to develop before going to Europe. Because in football if you are good it doesn’t matter where you play, everything will go on well with you.”

Those were the words of Black Stars coach Avram Grant, in April 2015, when asked for his take on the mass exodus of players from the local league. The constant snubbing of home-based players, coupled with the unabated departure of the league’s best players each season had become a canker bedevilling the local game. However, the Israeli’s speech – he calls it an advice – was one that inspired hope in the local game. He was clear on his intentions for the GPL; he wanted an all-inclusive Black Stars squad, at least per his utterances. It was meant to be the beginning of a new dawn: a period when locally-based players would be given a fair chance to stake a claim for their inclusion into the national team.

Two years ago when Grant led Ghana to the Africa Cup of Nations in Equatorial Guinea he included just one player from the Ghanaian league – then Ashanti Gold goalkeeper Fatau Dauda. It raised eyebrows, but he was given the benefit of the doubt on that occasion. Here was a coach who took over the reigns of the Black Stars with just a month to the 2015 AFCON. How was he going to use such a short period of time to access the local players? And with the start of the GPL having delayed due to uncontrollable matters of litigation, Grant surely couldn’t have called up local players based on just hearsay. That was understandable.

And it was expected that the former Chelsea boss would keep to his word in the subsequent months of his tenure. But it has been exactly two years since he took charge and nothing has changed. If for anything he has rather widened the gap that existed between home-based players and the national team. It was hoped that his utterances in 2015 would be the first step in the forming of that “all-inclusive” Black Stars that he talked about.

So when Ibrahim Sannie Dara – the Communications Director of the Ghana Football Association (GFA) – sat in the press room of the Ghana Football Association (GFA) Headquarters to communicate the decided squad to journalists, Ghanaians waited with bated breath.

Avram Grant sat on the left side of Sannie – so relaxed – as the latter did the talking on his behalf. The list was started from the goalkeepers’ position, and when Wa All Stars’ Richard Ofori was mentioned it was thought to be the first of at least two home-based players to be mentioned. The names kept coming but in the end, Ofori turned out to be the only name from the local league.

Once again the GPL has been snubbed. But this is all too familiar. The trick over the years has been to name one or two home-based goalkeepers in the squad as an excuse to the scrutiny that the decision will be met with. But this time no amount of talk can paper over the disservice done to the Ghana Premier League. How Latif Blessing of Liberty Professionals – a player with 17 goals from midfield – missed out on a place in Grant’s provisional 26-man squad for the tournament in Gabon is still a mystery. But more glaring is the fact that it totally typifies the disregard and disrespect that the technical handlers of the Black stars have for the GPL. It was the sort of day that will leave home-based players thinking the only way to get call-up into the national team is to move overseas.

The scenarios are aplenty. Latif Blessing and Samuel Tetteh both played in the Ghana Premier League earlier last season until the latter joined Red Bull Salzburg midway through the season. Both were standout performers in the first round of the league, with a large section of the media calling for the inclusion of the pair into the Black Stars set-up. All efforts to convince Grant of the ability of the duo fell on deaf ears but, immediately Tetteh moved overseas his fortunes with the national team changed. He has consistently earned call-ups to the Black Stars.

And it is not as if Tetteh plays in a topflight league. His loan move to Austrian second-tier side FC Liefering means he plays for a club that serves as a feeder club to parent club Red Bull Salzburg. Samuel Tetteh is a brilliant young chap by all standards – and that is evidenced by his impressive goal return – but what Grant has just done is to insinuate that the second-tier of Austrian football is a better league than that of Ghana’s top flight. That is disrespect!

Disrespect is when you ignore the GPL’s best player yet invite a Bernard Tekpetey who has made just one senior league appearance for Schalke 04; disrespect is when you say you invite players based on merit yet you have a first choice goalkeeper who is inactive starting ahead of the best goalkeeper in the Ghanaian league, and disrespect is when you give call-ups to players who add no value to the national team.

The Black Stars management committee chairman George Afriyie, his vice Osei Kweku Palmer and the GFA president Kwesi Nyantakyi have all countlessly outlined how Black Stars players will be invited “based on merit”. The most surprising statement came from the GFA president when he said the Black Stars "is not a district assembly where people are chosen based on electoral areas."

He was right in a way, but it was also a begrudging admission that players in the Ghanaian league are simply not good enough for the national team. That is disrespect.

Intriguingly, Latif Blessing has been the most consistent Ghanaian player in the past year. His 17 goals and 7 assists not only make him the highest scoring midfielder for Ghana, but also the nation’s most consistent performer in 2015/16. That should merit a call-up because his stats are up there with the nation’s best performers yet he has been ignored once again. It was meant to be the day when one of Ghana’s prodigious talents made a breakthrough into the national team set-up.

But it soon became a day that delivered the final nail on the coffin of home-based players pushing for a national team call-up. The message is clear: if Latif Blessing cannot get into the Black Stars squad on the back of such an impressive season, then there is almost a zero chance a local player will make get into that squad anytime soon.

Unfortunately, Grant’s snub of the Ghana Premier League’s top scorer and best player may come back to haunt the Black Stars. In a time when the national team is struggling to create goals, Blessing’s sharpness could have been a hidden weapon in Gabon. But he has been sidelined, sadly.