In appointing Swiss Nora Hauptle as the new head coach of Ghana’s women national team, the Black Queens, the Ghana Football Association (GFA) has broken with tradition.
In over three decades of existence, the team has never had an expatriate trainer; unusual, really, for a country with an almost insatiable appetite for that breed of coach.
One look at Hauptle’s résumé, though — oh, it helps that she has her own website — and an argument could be made that she’s probably worth ditching those long-standing norms for. Hauptle holds a Uefa Pro Licence, acquired in 2018, and has coaching experience from Germany’s Frauen-Bundesliga and at the helm of her country’s women’s U-19 national team.
Hauptle has also worked with the Israeli FA, but her expertise stretches far beyond football, into the realms of the Olympics, tennis and weightlifting, assigned to help athletes in her capacity as a fitness/strength coach. It’s not exactly star-studded stuff, but it’s high-profile enough. And what Hauptle lacks in glitter, she more than compensates for with her prior working knowledge of the Ghanaian women’s football system.
In July 2022, she took up an appointment as Technical Advisor for Ghana’s U-20 side, the Black Princesses, as the team prepared to compete at that year’s Fifa World Cup in Costa Rica. Ghana, coached by Ben Fokuo, had a campaign to forget, losing all three games and finishing bottom of an admittedly tough group.
That outcome reflected poorly on a team that, in all honesty, isn’t nearly as bad. Hauptle’s eye would have been caught, no doubt, by some especially excellent prospects ready to make a mark at senior level, the likes of Mukarama Abdulai, Evelyn Badu, and Doris Boaduwaa. Merge these with the likes of Princella Adubea, Gladys Amfobea and Portia Boakye, established seniors, and the potential for success is remarkable.
Speaking of success, Ghana hasn’t had a lot of it of late. It failed to qualify for the most recent Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (Wafcon), and didn’t make it past the first round of the edition before that (despite hosting it). The Queens once ranked only behind Nigeria as Africa’s dominant side, but they’ve now been overtaken by the likes of Cameroon, South Africa and Cameroon.
With the new crop and the old core, Hauptle has more than enough talent at her disposal to spark a resurgence.
But, then again, talent has never really been the Queens’ big need, has it?
More than anything, what has held Ghana back are the failings of its handlers, especially the long spells of inactivity between assignments. The team’s skipper, Elizabeth Addo, complained about that specific issue and got banished for her troubles; she’s still under exile, by the way, and her return should be one of the first things Hauptle negotiates.
Until those concerns are satisfactorily addressed, and other necessary measures required to sharpen the edge of the Queens taken, not even Sarina Wiegman — winner of the last two editions of the Uefa Women’s Championship, and arguably the best women’s coach in the world — would succeed at the task of making the team competitive again.
That’s the challenge Hauptle has accepted, though, and she’d have to make do with what resources she’s afforded. A glimpse of what methods the 39-year-old might employ shone through an interview from when she first joined up with the Princesses.
“There are a lot of talents in this team with different strengths and we need to focus on the strengths,” Hauptle said.
“There are some players who are skillful, others are speedy and also personalities in the team. We need to build on our strength. Some of the players play together in the country and so they have a good playing rhythm. We need to level up all those players and bring together the right players for the right match setting.”
The former Switzerland international’s work is cut out for her, and she would do well to lay out her plans and implement them soon enough, as Ghana hosts the African Games this year and qualifiers for the next Wafcon aren’t far away.
Should the FA do its own bit, all of this could eventually add up to something pretty meaningful — something, truly, fruitful.
Enn Y. Frimpong — Ink & Kicks
