Asamoah Gyan: I scored 20 penalties in training day before Uruguay miss
Asamoah Gyan has revealed that he shot 20 penalties in training against Richard Kingson and scored all of them a day before missing his crucial penalty against Uruguay at the 2010 World Cup.
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It will be recalled that Ghana was on the verge of becoming the first African team to reach the semi-finals of the World Cup before losing on penalties to Uruguay following a 1-1 draw in regulation and extra time.
The defeat was made more painful by the fact that Ghana had a penalty in the final seconds of extra time after Luis Suarez used his hand to keep out Dominic Adiyiah’s goal-bound header.
Although Suarez was sent off for his unsporting act and Ghana awarded a penalty, Gyan missed from the spot, with Uruguay going on to record a 4-2 victory in the shootout.
“A day before the Uruguay game, I shot 20 penalties against our goalkeeper at training,” Gyan told FIFA in an interview.
“I scored all 20. I was going to my left side of the goalkeeper and I saw him and then I saw him going to my right when I was shooting the ball.
“He feinted me and then he went to where the ball was going. I didn’t know how the ball went up. Technically there was something wrong. I didn’t have the right technique.”
Over 12 years after that incident, Gyan believes he let down his country and the whole continent by missing that penalty.
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