Former Black Stars Captain Stephen Appiah has blamed local football fans for the retirement of national team players. The former Juventus star believes fans are overly critical about the performances of players and that pushes them to hang up their boots. Appiah decided to quit the Black Stars after the 2010 FIFA World Cup finals in South Africa citing personal reasons but it was rumoured he was furious with persistent calls for retirement after recovering from a career-threatening knee injury. An impressive display for Serbian side Vojvodina last season proved the former Fenerbache player has not gone past his prime. Stephen Appiah in an interview with JOY Sports noted that, he was struggling to understand the public’s leading role in the retirement of players. “We don’t retire early but it's rather the people that force some of us to retire”. He told JOY Sports “It's unbelievable and I find it difficult to understand why people try to retire footballers in Africa, it hardly happens in Europe because the likes of Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes are still playing”. “We should to put a stop to this because it doesn’t help”