Former Black Stars defender, Sammy Osei Kufour says he had to change his plan of ending his career with a Ghana Premier League club to avoid any unnecessary insults and criticisms from Ghanaian football fans. The 34-year-old, who announced his retirement from the sport on yesterday, has had a long and illustrious club career in Europe winning the Uefa Champions League with Bayern Munich in the 2000-01 season and also played for the likes of Livorno, Nuremberg, AS Roma, Ajax and Torino. But, after returning home he says he couldn’t bear playing before ungrateful fans who would possibly hurl insults at him like they had done to his ex-team mate in the Black Stars, Laryea Kingston when he returned home last season to sign for Hearts of Oak. Osei Kuffuor told JOY Sports, “When Laryea (Kingston) was out contract, he returned to play for Hearts of Oak. One day he was going somewhere and he turned on his radio and some people were saying Laryea what can he do again?” He added that, “Like me playing for Kotoko against Accra Hearts of Oak, it will be amazing but the way the people react made me stop because I don’t want anybody to insult me. For me, if you insult me, I don’t care, but my mother and children, it will kill me so that’s why I said no.” Osei Kuffuor, who made 59 appearances for the Black Stars and represented Ghana at the 2006 World Cup, will end his career with a big testimonial match at the Baba Yara stadium in Kumasi this December. Former Manchester United strikers Andy Cole and Dwight Yorke are pencilled in for the match, along with Samuel Eto'o, Alex Song, Stefan Effenberg, Shaun Bartlett, Edgar Davids and Patrick Kluivert, with proceeds of the game going to a Kumasi-based orphanage.