Former Black Stars coach, CK Akonnor has disclosed that Dutch winger Cody Gakpo rejected a call-up to play for Ghana.[ads2]
According to Akonnor, this was before the PSV Eindhoven talisman made his debut for the Netherlands senior national team.
The 23-year old is born to a Dutch mother and a Ghanaian father with relations in Togo and was eligible to play for any of the three countries but decided to play for Netherlands.[ads3]
Speaking as the analyser for the 2022 FIFA World Cup game between Netherlands and Senegal, CK Akonnor who coached the Ghana senior national team from 2020-2021 indicated that there were attempts to convince Gakpo to play for Ghana but the winger ended up rejecting a Black Stars call-up.
“Yes we tried to let him play for Ghana but he ended up rejecting us for Netherlands. This was about a year ago when he was at the junior level”, Akonnor said.[ads4]
As a PSV academy graduate, Gakpo made his first-team debut for the club in February 2018. In the 2021–22 season, he won the Dutch Footballer of the Year award after scoring 21 goals in 47 games in all competitions.
Gakpo played youth international football for the Netherlands from under-18 to under-21 level. He made his senior international debut in June 2021 at Euro 2020.[ads5]
