SPORTS AND RECREATION
Football, known as soccer, is the national sport and passion in Ghana. It has a huge following. The Under 17 National Team has won the Under 17 World Cup twice since 1990. Ghanaian football players are watched and sometimes recruited to play for other countries. High salaries entice players to go elsewhere. The World Cup is the goal of Ghanaians as it is for any soccer playing country.
After a lapse of eight years, the National Sport Festival has resumed its activities. This event brings together Ghanaian athletes from ten administrative regions for competition in a variety of sports. Teams from the armed forces, the police, fire services and university sports associations are some of the groups that participate at the festival. The variety of sports included are soccer, netball, handball, basketball, volleyball, table tennis, tae-kwon-do, boxing, speed walking, badminton and hockey.
Did you know?

In the 1980s and 1990s, Ghana's Azuma Nelson, was the World Boxing Council's Featherweight and Super Featherweight champion.

Track and field is a popular event with a particular focus on sprints and relay, the long jump and triple jumps.

Storytelling is a favourite recreational pastime treasured by the Ghanaians. Typical social gatherings include stories, spontaneous poems, folklore, drama, music and song. Drums often accompany storytelling. Usually respected elders tell the stories. They often convey a moral lesson. Anansi, the spider, a favourite protagonist, always seems to land in trouble, yet manages to save himself from doom every time.