Ghana coach Otto Addo has apologised for criticising referee Ismail Elfath after the defeat to Portugal at the 2022 World Cup.
Otto Addo blamed the referee for Ghana’s 3-2 loss to Portugal, claiming the Europeans had the support of the American official.
Portugal was awarded a controversial second-half penalty and relied on it to get off to a winning start, much to the chagrin of Otto Addo, who criticised the referee after the game.
He said: “It was really a wrong decision. We played the ball. I don’t know why VAR didn’t come up. There is no explanation for me.
“The referee was not in our favour.”
Asked whether the foul was given because it was Ronaldo, Addo replied: “I think you have to ask the referee. I have no proof of that. We were playing the ball and then there was contact.
“I don’t know whether they were not paying, or whether the VAR was not paying attention. If you look at the replay, we played the ball, it was actually a foul against us.”
However, the former Ghana international retracted those remarks on Sunday. He claimed that he was emotional after the loss, which caused him to be “a little rude” when speaking to the press.
“Up to this point we haven’t gotten any answer from FIFA [on why VAR didn’t check the penalty decision], and maybe I can use this stage now to apologise. It was a little bit rude but I was very emotional after the match. Hopefully, I won’t get a fine,” Otto Addo said.
Otto Addo was speaking ahead of Ghana’s crucial match against South Korea on Monday at the Education Stadium.
The four-time African champions cannot afford to lose because it would mean the end of their tournament.
“We will see a passionate team against South Korea. We will see the same passion in the last game. Everybody is hungry to play and training good making it difficult for me to make my decisions,” he assured.
The game will begin at 1 p.m. local time.