Hearts wins President's Cup

Accra, July 1, GNA - Troubled Accra Hearts of Oak defeated Sekondi Eleven Wise on penalties to win this years President's Cup Competition at the Ohene Djan Stadium, Accra on Thursday, July 1.

Hearts converted five of the seven penalties, whilst Wise had four of their kicks right.


The game, which formed part of activities marking this years Republic Day Celebrations, provided the Phobians a perfect opportunity to appease their fans after seeing their 14 point lead on the Premier League table drop to 12.


It also settled the scores between the two sides as their two previous matches had ended without a winner.


With GHC 7,000 as the prize money and a giant trophy at stake, both sides approached the game with the seriousness it deserved and battled for supremacy in every department of the field.


It was however Hearts who called Wise's goalkeeper Mohammed Alhassan to duty on three occasions as he had to parry to corner goal bound shots from Francis Bossman and Samuel Affum who benefited immensely from the footwork of nimble footed Tawrick Gibril in the first quarter of the game.

Wise on the other hand were presented with two free kicks at the edge of the box, which were blasted off target by James Bissaw and Zacharia Abdulai after they took control of the game at the latter stages of the first half.


After an exciting and balanced first half, the second half saw Wise taking dominance of the game as they pinned Hearts to their own side creating several goal scoring opportunities which were however wasted. Despite their dominance, Wise had their men reduced to 10 after Stephen Aidoo was sent off by referee Joseph Lamptey for a second bookable offence in the 52nd minute.


Substitute Yaw Nyarko and Eric Owusu also went into the caution book for violent conducts.


The Phobians failed to take advantage of the numerical strength of the Western Show Boys, even though they mounted some amount of pressure on them.


It was instead Wise who took the lead in the 61st minute, through Winfred Dormon, who capitalized on a defensive blunder by Dan Coleman to direct the ball into the net for the opener to silence the expectant home crowd that had the Vice President John Mahama and other officials in attendance.

The lead lasted for just six minutes before substitute Eric Gawu directed a mid volley into the net in the 67th minute to level up for his side following a mis-understanding by the Wise defence. Hearts then took a slight dominance of the exchanges and pressured their opponents for the match winner, whilst a counter attack approach adopted by Wise also saw them creating few decent chances with Dormon and Michael Ocansey giving the Hearts defence much to worry about. The Western Show Boys however were unable to convert the chances they created.


As the game progressed, it was the Phobians who had much of the exchanges and could have fetched the match winner during injury time but Affum's re-bound went off target after Gawu had set him up with a well executed cross to push the game into penalty shootout.


Bossman, Karim Alhassan, Kwabena Boafo, keeper Laud Quartey and Eric Gawu converted their kicks with Affum and Douglass Nkrumah failing. Ocansey who was voted the Most Valuable Player (MVP), Dormon, Edmund Sakyi and Yaw Nyarko scored for Wise, whilst Eric Owusu, Ohene Addo, and Abdulai missed their kicks to send the Phobians into wild jubilation right into the night.