Growing up in the '90s, historians never poured out Ghanaian rich sports archives without skipping a certain Kumasi Asante Kotoko, in fact pulling Ko
Growing up in the ’90s, historians never poured out Ghanaian rich sports archives without skipping a certain Kumasi Asante Kotoko, in fact pulling Kotoko out of Ghana and to some extent African football history, makes it entirely shoddy and inaccurate.
August 1935 must be remembered as sacred and blessing in African football history because it has contributed immensely to the rich archives of African football by producing a certain Asante Kotoko based in Kumasi, Ashanti region.
The Porcupine warriors as affectionately called didn’t just compete locally but translated it on the African continent, competing in 7 African champions league finals, where they won 2 in 1970 against TP Englebert of Zaire and 1983 against Al Ahly of Egypt and succumbing five times to Tp Englebert in 1967, Canoun Yaoundé of Cameroon in 1971, Vita club of Zaire in 1973, Al Ahly of Egypt in 1982 and Zamalek of Egypt in 1993.
While winning elite laurels as a club, Asante Kotoko was also producing Great players directly from the team to compete for the African footballer of the year award.
In 1971, Ibrahim Sunday of Kotoko won the second prestigious African footballer of the year at the expense of fellow teammates Robert Mensah and Francois Ndumbé.
Abdul Karim Razak of Kotoko also became African footballer of the year in 1978 over Ali Bencheikh of Mc Algiers and Thomas N’kono of Canoun Yaounde.
Opoku Nti after scoring that decider to win the elite Champions league for Kotoko in 1983 against Al Ahly, became 2nd best player on the continent that particular year.
There is no doubt that Asante Kotoko has a rich history that is highly revered but in the last two decades, the club has lost direction by consistent failure to compete at the top level of Caf elite club competitions where clubs like Al Ahly, Zamalek, Tp Mazembe have consistently targeted.
At 86, a standard training centre and clubhouse for both senior and academy players shouldn’t be a challenge but the club is still facing an infrastructural deficit by spending millions of cedis on players rent every season.
Kotoko needs rich results going forward therefore the flimsy excuses must end…
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Source: Ghana/Herosportsgh.com/Obed Atuah Adams
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