Stephen Appiah as a special guest at Wembley Stadium

Now Ghana is a former captain, Stephen Appiah as a special guest for Tuesday's historic friendly against England in Wembley stadium.

Ghana Football Association boss, Kwesi Nyantakyi, a former star for the country's national team delegation that Wembley Stadium will play a friendly against England in honor of his name has decided to join.

The former Ghana captain was awarded ‘Ghana Footballer of the Year’ for three consecutive years: 2005, 2006 and 2007.

Appiah player in Turkey this year's award he earned in 2007 for Fenerbahçe played before joining the Series A league giants, Juventus, Bologna, Udinese and Cesena.

GFA decided to reward Appiah for his influence in qualifying Ghana for their first two World Cups.

Ghana FA boss Kwesi Nyantakyi said emphatically, "Appiah must be part of this historic team, as he played a major role in what the Black Stars has become today".

He added, “We want the other players on the squad to see that when you serve your country with all of your heart that your country will recognise and reward you".

The Black Stars icon just before the historic game in London on Monday, a day will be included in GFA delegation.

Appish said, “The Ghana FA protocol director told me that I am part of the GFA’s delegation to England”.

“I want to thank Mr Nyantakyi, Mr Fred Pappoe my ex-Black Stars team-mates and the people of Ghana for giving me the opportunity," Appiah added.

England's friendly with Ghana on Sunday before leading the 2012 African Nations Cup qualifier in Congo face is set.

the Ghana icon concluded, “Now let’s beat Congo on Sunday, defeat England on Tuesday and Ghana will continue to rise”.

Wembley Stadium: Blacon junior footballers to play on hallowed turf

At the home of football BLACON Youth JFC will be playing Wembley Stadium on Thursday August 12, along with 55 other clubs for The FA/McDonald’s National Football Festival.
As well as playing on the hallowed turf, the young teams will also meet two of English football’s greatest ever strikers Sir Geoff Hurst, ’66 hat trick hero and McDonald’s Head of Football and Michael Owen, one of the highest scoring England players of all time.
The youngsters will have their opportunity to get a footage taken with the two England heroes during their once in a lifetime trip to Wembley Stadium.
The FA/McDonald’s National Football Festival is the pinnacle of McDonald’s Open Day tour which, this year, has seen McDonald’s franchisees partner with local football clubs to host free football open days in communities across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
More than 700 youngsters will take part in the day long event which consists of non competitive games, coaching sessions and McDonald’s inflatables, the perfect chance to young players to improve their techniques.

Wembley Stadium's pitch consultants resign

The pitch consultants in charge of the playing surface at Wembley Stadium have resigned.

The news was confirmed on Wednesday after almost constant complaints about the playing surface since it was first laid.

The pitch has performed poorly on almost every major occasion for which it has been used, with recent major finals marred by the players slipping and the surface cutting up far too easily.

The Sports Turf Research Institute (STRI) confirmed that they would be stepping down from the role at the end of June after being responsible for the surface for the last 13 months.

"We have had many constructive and positive discussions with Wembley over the last few weeks on what would be the best way forward to make significant improvements to the pitch," said Gordon MacKillop, chief exective of STRI.

"In relation to this STRI presented an alternative strategy for 2010 to change the construction of the pitch, which Wembley agreed was the best way forward and is now proceeding with this.

"We are pleased that Wembley has adopted our proposed strategy which should see improvements to the pitch during 2010. This new structure of pitch does not require the previous level of research and consultancy from the STRI team and, therefore, we feel it is the right time to resign."

FA say they can't fix Wembley pitch until 2023

England's chances of hosting the World Cup in 2018 could be harmed by the news that the pitch at Wembley Stadium may have to be relaid as many as seven times a year until 2023.
A crisis meeting held today at the stadium attended by ground staff consultants, Football Association officials and the Institute of Groundsmanship failed to come up with any solution to the current problems other than having to constantly rip up the surface at a potential cost of over £8million.
It is thought that the pitch will be relaid before the Carling Cup and FA Cup Finals and at regular intervals throughout the season to coincide with England friendlies.
Geoff Webb of The IoG revealed that because of ongoing loan repayments the stadium will remain multi-purpose for the next 12 years at least.
"It is quite common for this to be the case at venue of this kind," he said.
"The FA have admitted that the pitch that was laid for the FA Cup semi-finals was too hard. But they hope that in future they will be able to solve the problem."
Having spent more than £750m on the stadium, the FA need to service their debts and have consequently allowed major sporting events to take place there, including rugby union and NFL matches, while the venue is regularly used to stage big concerts.
The easy alternative would be to reduce the number of events at the stadium but the FA are hamstrung by the debts.
The latest set of figures available at Companies House showed Wembley suffered huge pre-tax losses of £31.1m, following its £53.3m pre-tax loss in 2007.
At present, it is not expected to break even until 2014 and that will only occur if the number of events presently held stays at its present rate. It is still possible that Wembley could default on agreements with banks over its £326m loans if Club Wembley sales drop, which would certainly be the case if fewer events were held.
A new surface is currently being put down following Saturday's rugby match between Saracens and Harlequins when huge chunks of the surface reared up during scrummages, and it will be the 11th time it has been relaid since the stadium opened.
The new surface will be severely tested in the coming weeks with the FA Cup Final between Portsmouth and Chelsea to come on 15 May, before four play-off finals and England's World Cup warm-up friendly against Mexico.
The bigger fear for the FA is that next season's Champions League Final that is being hosted at the rebuilt Wembley for the first time will have the same problems with the turf. Such a scenario in a high-profile global match could only harm England's chances of then hosting the World Cup in 2018.
The pitch attracted fierce criticism after both FA Cup semi-finals earlier this month as Tottenham manager Harry Redknapp branded it "farcical" and said: "You wouldn't see players falling over all the time on a Sunday in the park".
Manchester United striker Michael Owen's season was ended after picking up a hamstring injury during the Carling Cup Final victory over Aston Villa and Sir Alex Ferguson said: "I think the heavy pitch at Wembley made some contribution to it."
Webb believes the pitch management could be improved. It has been the responsibility of the Sports Turf Research Institute since former head groundsman Steve Welch was sacked last year.
"I think it's coming down to the management of the situation itself within the stadium," Webb added. "You've got to look at the decision-making process and you've got to look at the control of that process as well."

Wembley Stadium Elmor rock out in the shadow

Promising young bands one of Guildfoed's took to the stage in front of more than 20,000 people in the shadow of the Wembley Stadium arch last week.
Elmor were hand picked to entertain the masses prior to the New England Patriots versus Tampa Bay Buccaneers American football match.
The band played a 40 minute set at NFLUK’s official party, which was held next to the famous stadium.
Lead guitarist Tristan Patrick Sherfield said: “It was absolutely amazing. We’re used to playing in front of 250 people so playing in front of 20,000 was a shock to the system.
“It didn’t phase us though, we lapped it up.
"We came on after the Buccaneers cheerleaders. We were backstage with them, I should’ve at least got my photo taken with them.”

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