A visit to the Right to Dream Academy by GHANAsoccernet.com�s Ameenu Shardow on Thursday revealed some of the great things happening in Ghana football.
Located in the southern town of Akosombo in the Eastern Region, founder Tom Vernon has assembled one of the finest professionals in the world to help equip the deprived youth with skills to compete with any other on this planet.
One of such professionals; Richard Evans, a physiotherapist, was brought in from the UK to handle the health department of the academy.
The 26-year-old University of Huddesfield graduate takes us through his daily functions in making sure that recruits at the academy are well conditioned to do the day�s work.
�I start my work every morning, going round to see whether any player has a problem probably sustained the night before,� he tells GHANAsoccernet.com.
�If there is such a problem we bring them in, access the problem and then put a regime in place in helping the player get back fully fit to rejoin training.�
But Richard Evans is not a doctor and therefore how is he able to properly access health conditions of players and most importantly put measures in place in making that player fully fit.
�Yes, I am not a doctor and therefore when I make assessment and it goes beyond me, because we have a network of health professionals here at RTD we are able to refer cases.
�For instance I work closely with a doctor at Korle-Bu Hospital; I also have friends back in England who I talk to whenever I am in doubt of a problem here.�
One other aspect of Evans� job is to recommend training methods and procedures to minimize injury rates at the academy, he explains.
�Here in Africa very little attention is paid to the pre-training activities and therefore players even get injured more in training than during games.
�It is therefore also part of my job to ensure that such activities fitting into the coaches training sessions are well thought to not only minimize injuries but also to ensure that players are always ready to give off their best at a 100%.�
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