Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama has stressed the need to set up a committee to investigate the circumstances surrounding the elimination of the Black Stars from the World Cup tournament.

Ghana for the first time in its World Cup history failed to reach the second round following their 1-2 defeat to Portugal in the final Group G match in Brasilia on Thursday.

The Black Stars, quarter-finalist four years ago, finished bottom in Group G with one point following defeat to the United States and a draw with Germany.

"We need to look at the team as a whole. We need to set up a committee to look at the whole system of what happened in Brazil 2014 right from the preparation, through the build up to the World Cup, to when they went to Brazil, to what happened in Brazil until they came back," he told journalists in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, on the sides of the AU Summit.

He also called for the rebuilding of the team and urged the nation to take heart after a disappointing loss and continue to support the national team even in their loss.

"Let's rebuild, let's do a post-mortem and see what went wrong and see what we could have done better and fix it," he said.

Ghana's World Cup campaign has been dogged by controversies after the team nearly boycotted the game against Portugal over unpaid appearance fees, leading to the ouster of two players, Sulley Ali Muntari and Kevin-Prince Boateng, from the team's camp for misconduct. Endi