World

Christian Atsu: Ghanaian footballer missing in Turkiye

Ghanaian international soccer player Christian Atsu has gone missing following the Turkiye earthquake, the club and his agent said on Thursday, following earlier reports that he had been rescued from the rubble. wreckage of a collapsed building and was taken to the hospital.

Atsu’s condition and whereabouts are still unknown. Aydin Toksoz, vice president of football club Hatayspor, told Turkiye’s state-run Anadolu news agency that the club’s sporting director Taner Savut was also missing following the massive earthquake that hit southern Turkiye and Syria and has now killed more than 19,000 people. numbers are expected to increase.

Atsu, 31, who has played for English clubs Chelsea and Newcastle, signed for Hatayspor late last year. The club is based in the southern city of Antakya, near the epicenter of the earthquake that struck in the early hours of Monday and devastated the area. Atsu and Savut are believed to have been in the collapsed buildings, the club said.

Nana Sechere, Atsu’s agent, said in a text message to The Associated Press that he had gone to Turkiye to try to find Atsu but the player “has yet to be found.”

Hatayspor and Ghana’s football association announced on Tuesday that Atsu was rescued from a dilapidated building on Monday night and taken to a medical facility for treatment.

Toksoz said Hatayspor is currently “unable to confirm this information”.

“We were unable to contact Atsu or Taner Savut,” Toksoz told Anadolu Agency.

Ghana’s ambassador to Turkiye said she was also looking for Atsu. Francisca Ahsitey-Odunton told Ghana radio she was given a list of 200 hospitals or medical facilities to which Atsu could have been sent if he was rescued and she was also unable to confirm who he was. Where are you playing?

She said she hoped he was in one of those hospitals and his location was unconfirmed “in a mess, which is understandable given the circumstances.”

Antakya was one of the cities hardest hit by the magnitude 7.8 earthquake, which destroyed thousands of buildings in Turkiye alone and sent more than 110,000 rescuers scrambling to find them. The survivors were trapped under the rubble. More than 63,000 people were injured in Turkiye.

Atsu scored late in injury time to give Hatayspor a 1-0 win over Istanblul-based Kasimpaya SK in the Turkish league on Sunday, earning him praise from his new club hours before the match. land occurs.


Associated Press writers Suzan Fraser in Ankara and Francis Kokutse in Accra, Ghana, contributed to this report.



Source by [author_name]

news7h

News7h: Update the world's latest breaking news online of the day, breaking news, politics, society today, international mainstream news .Updated news 24/7: Entertainment, Sports...at the World everyday world. Hot news, images, video clips that are updated quickly and reliably

Related Articles

Back to top button