Ghana and Hapoel Tel-Aviv defender John Pantsil (formerly of Fulham and West Ham United) has been arrested by the East Legon Police in Accra on allegation of assaulting his wife on Friday but the wife has denied the Black Stars player stabbed her.

Richlove Pantsil is asking the East Legon Police to release her husband from custody at the police station in the leafy suburb of Accra to ensure that they resolve their differences at home. The couple have been reported to be arguing over the past few days after a fan told some radio stations that the defender bedded a prostitute at the Africa Cup of Nations tournament in South Africa.

Even though the defender and the Ghana Football Association have strongly denied that players of the Black Stars engaged the services of prostitutes during the tournament, radio stations have continued to carry the allegation made by a fan called Appiah Stadium.

The Kumasi-based football fan, Stadium has accused the Hapeol Tel Aviv player of having sexual intercourse with the ladies. Details remain sketchy as to whether the incident happened before Ghana’s semi-final defeat to Burkina Faso or after that.

Pantsil-who was making his fifth Nations Cup finals appearance-is incensed with the allegations and want to clear his name in the courtroom.

On Monday, Pantsil angrily reacted on Accra-based Happy FM. ”I don’t know where these stories are coming from and I’m disgusted by the false claims being made against me by Appiah Stadium. He came to me demanding for money for making JP T-shirts but I refused to pay because I had not authorised him to do so. Since that time he has harboured hatred for me and making all sorts of useless allegations against me. 

“My image has been battered and I will take him on. It is the same thing that he did against Asamoah Gyan which resulted in a near fisticuff at the Golden Tulip Hotel in Kumasi some time back. The allegations are false, unfounded, wicked and malicious and I will do whatever is necessary to redeem my bruised image.”

This resulted in a misunderstanding which resulted in the alleged assault that attracted the attention of neighbours who called in the police to arrest the defender. Latest reports say the wife has been released from the hospital where she was being observed by doctors following the incident.

This was confirmed by Greater Accra Police PRO Freeman Tettey in an interview with BBC Africa yesterday.

“The information available to us is that he stabbed his wife in the upper eyelid, so we had to quickly rescue the wife and send her to hospital,” said Accra police spokesman Freeman Tettey. “For now, he is in our custody and we are in the investigation process. We are holding him for causing (bodily) harm to his wife and for assaulting his neighbour. The wife scaled a wall to a neighbour’s house for protection and immediately, John Pantsil also pursued her, came to the neighbour’s house, gave him some slaps and threatened to shoot him. That scared the gentleman who rushed to the police to lodge a complaint.”

The couple who have three kids have been happily married for years but the allegation of engaging prostitutes, which has been heavily denied by the player and the GFA, looked to have brought a strain on their relationship.

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