Ghana coach Kwesi Appiah has responded to critics of his call-ups into the senior national team, insisting he owes no one an explanation. 

Appiah, who is in his second spell as Black Stars coach, received a lot of backlash from the public after his decision to leave out some key players for the last game backfired spectacularly. 

The 58-year-old did not invite skipper Asamoah Gyan, Andre Ayew and his younger brother Jordan for the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier against Kenya in Nairobi. 

The Black Stars went on to lose the game 1-0, and many pointed fingers at the absence of the players as the cause of the defeat. But Appiah disagrees and believes every player he calls deserves a place in his team.

“I hear some of my colleagues all the time saying I need to explain my call-ups. Ghana has got thousands of players,” he told Ghanaweb.

“There are so many players on my data, so much so that I can sit here and call about five different teams. And that is excluding the local based players.

“There are so many players, so if I’m going to explain why a player is not playing every time we have a match, how can I explain that?

“I believe that if I should even explain, then it should be to fellow technical people who will understand.”

The Black Stars’ next game is a 2019 AFCON qualifying doubleheader against Sierra Leone in October