Leicester City qualified for the English Premier League this weekend.
One must wonder what a journalist from Accra with no business in Leicester is doing writing about an English team that is only remembered in this part of the world as the launch pad for Emile Heskey.
The answer is linked in a fairly unGhanaian name.
Schlupp.
Jeffrey Schlupp is part of the Leicester team that left all comers in their wake in the battle for promotion.Infact he is a very important member of the team,playing at left back for the Foxes.
Now I have your attention. Left back.
The one position that refuses to be solved as a problem for the Black Stars. Several varieties have been tried in the role for the past four years. Masahudu Alhassan was to young and raw, David Addy is the experienced campaigner who cannot seem to take his chance, Harrison Afful is the current right holder of the position though he is now a right sided midfielder at Esperance.
Daniel Opare and Samuel Inkoom have all had a try out in the position and none has reasonably proven to be a solution.
Well it is my view that Kwasi Appiah and his friends can stop looking because Schlupp solves his problems with a World Cup on the horizon and a group filled with teams boasting of supremely pacy and talented wingers.
Ronaldo comes to mind.
For those who still wonder who I am talking about, Schlupp is a Ghanaian player born in Germany.He migrated with his parents to England at an early age and joined Leicester as a school boy. The rest is history.
Mind you I took some convincing because I recall him as a pacy, raw striker who looked out of his depth so guess my surprise when I started reading great reviews from colleagues on a very good left back by the same name.
Left back.
The one position that refuses to be solved as a problem for the Black Stars.
Several varieties have been tried in the role for the past four years.
In fact he had gotten so good Manchester United gave him a three week trial in 2013 to have a better look at him.
I had my own look in a league game against Burnley and boy was I blown away. All the raw skills he had failed to harness as a striker seemed to have clicked into place once Nigel Pearson had his epiphany to transform him into a defender.
Schlupp is left footed, very very fast, powerful, surprisingly adept defensively with good instincts and has a mean shot on him. In fact there is a bit of Toulouse’s Ivorian full back Serge Aurier about him and we all know he is the latest crave in town.
There is no certainty he will fare any better now in the Black Stars than he did for his sole cap in 2011 against Gabon but the greater crime will be not giving him a try out at all in the face of the obvious deficit in that position.
This piece was first published on AllSports.com.gh
By: Godfred Akoto-Boafo