Ghana's Asamoah Gyan bemoans penalty miss in South Korea

Posted: 2011-06-13 13:23

Ghana striker Asamoah Gyan has admitted that his penalty miss against South Korea was one of his poorest kicks ever, after Ghana lost 2-1 to the Asians in an international friendly at Jeonju World Cup Stadium. 

Gyan, who missed an high-pressure penalty kick against Uruguay at the 2010 World Cup, failed to pull the Stars level on 14 minutes after his low penalty was comfortably saved by Korean goalkeeper Jung Sung-Ryeon.
 
The Sunderland striker eventually made amends, scoring after Sulley Muntari's defence-splitting pass found him, but it was not enough as Ghana lost its first game under Serbian coach Goran Stevanovic.
 
Speaking to E TV, the forward acknowledged that he could have done much better with his kick.
 
“It was a poor kick I didn’t see the goalkeeper moving,” he said. “There was no power in it so I will say it is one of the poorest kicks I have ever taken.
 
“You know it is one of those things but I came back to score so I’m ok,” the 25-year-old stated.
 
The Ghana superstar similarly missed some glorious chances in the famous friendly game against England, but still managed to score the equaliser deep into injury time. Gyan said his resilience comes from his mental toughness.
 
“Personally, I don’t know because I’m somebody who is mentally strong no matter what. As I always say, I don’t doubt my quality at all so any time things go wrong I have to compromise myself and come back strongly.
 
“So that is what happened. I missed the penalty in the first half and I said to myself we’ve got more time so I have to come back and score. So that is what happened,” he added.