For many Ghanaians at home and abroad, Thursday might not be a good time to be away from their television sets or the internet so they can follow the Ghana-Portugal game.

But for those Ghanaians who were travelling on British Airways from London to Accra on 26 June, 2014 there was an opportunity to follow the game live on their screens and mobile devices on board.

According to British Airways, this has been made possible through a new technology they have introduced on board that would allow passengers to have access to the internet on board, through WI-FI. 

During the flight some sections of the cabin were decorated with Ghanaian flags.

A passenger on board the flight remarked: “Today can be described as the day a British carrier flew the Ghanaian flag”.

Some passengers were also in their Black Stars jersey ‘doing their own thing’.

For many watching the game on board, it was a real experience even though they were about 40,000 feet above sea level.

It was so surprising how the flight crew was hoping that Ghana would beat Portugal and qualify to the knock out stage of the World Cup competition.

The flight also had some football personalities on board like John Paintsil, who really electrified the atmosphere in the cabin - making passengers feel like they were in Brazil watching the game. Some passengers were also tweeting to show their relatives that although they were in the air, they still had an opportunity to watch the game. 

General Manager for Africa and Middle East and Asia Pacific, Jamie Cassidy told Joy Business, this is part of their bid to ensure that passengers stay in touch with their families and business partnership even when they are in the air flying to another country. 

But there was a great disappointment on the faces of the passengers when Portugal scored their second goal, dashing all the hopes that Ghana could make it to the knock out stage.

The Panasonic system fitted in the flight is able to stream live TV via satellites, allowing customers to connect to four free channels, including Sport24, CNN, Euronews and BBC World News.

“I’ve watched football matches in just about every conceivable place, but never thought that I’d be watching the Black Stars play Portugal at over 30,000 feet over Africa,” said Joe Addo, a passenger.

John Paintsil added: “Live football five miles up in the sky – that’s the height of in-flight entertainment.”

Although the specially equipped Boeing 747 is few of the airline’s aircraft currently offering live streaming sport, travellers on other flights will not miss that much. British Airways is showing special highlight shows of the football from Brazil, Wimbledon tennis championships to Formula 1 motor-racing on its long-haul flights. Its in-flight entertainment systems also provide a choice of more than 130 movies, 650 television shows, some 550 audio albums and 225 radio shows.