The Ghana Football Association (GFA) Friday signed a 15 million-US dollar deal with state-run oil exploration agency, Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), to sponsor the senior national male football team, the Black Stars.

The three-to-five-year renewable contract will see the oil exploration company become the headline sponsor of the national team with a yearly package of 3 million dollars, following the exit of Goldfields Ghana Limited (GGL), which has been sponsoring the Black Stars since 2005.

"This sponsorship from GNPC will go a long way. This will alleviate the financial burden on government and also motivate the players and boost their morale in winning the tournament (Africa Cup of Nations)," GFA President Kwesi Nyantakyi said at the signing ceremony.

"With this support from an indigenous company, the players and technical team, which is also headed by a Ghanaian, will know that the whole nation is behind them," he said.

The Chief Executive Officer of the GNPC, Nana Boakye Asafu- Adjaye, expressed his outfit's contentment with their association with the national team, a partnership he said was in consonance with the company's values.

"The Black Stars is a very potent vehicle for projecting GNPC's brand as a dependable partner in oil and gas exploration globally, " Asafu-Adjaye said. "The Black Stars are a perfect fit for GNPC. We both aspire to compete successfully on the global stage in a manner that impacts Ghanaians positively and profoundly."

He was of the expectation that, with the coming on board of the sponsorship deal, the Black Stars will go all out to win the upcoming Africa Cup in South Africa and go beyond the semi-finals at the 2014 World Cup due in Brazil.

The Black Stars will leave Accra on Friday evening for their 11- day camp in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates ( UAE).

Ghana will be camping in Abu Dhabi from January 7-16 to prepare for the Cup of Nations tournament to be held from January 19 and has lined up friendly matches against Tunisia and Egypt in Abu Dhabi early 2013.

The Black Stars, who are drawn in Group B alongside Mali, Niger and DR Congo, will be based at Port Elizabeth in South Africa.

Ghana placed fourth at the 2012 CAF Nations Cup co-hosted by Gabon and Equatorial Guinea last year.