Ghana's top teams historic rivals

LONDON, England -- Bitter rivalry has long marked the relationship between two of the biggest names in this soccer-mad continent: Hearts of Oak and Asante Kotoko.

In fact the competition between the Ghanaian teams at the centre of the Accra Sports' Stadium tragedy, is one of the oldest in African club football -- meaning there was a heavy police presence for the match.

Hearts, formed by youths from the Ussher Town district of Accra in 1911, won the first national champions title in 1958 -- with Kotoko, established in 1926, taking it the next year.

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Today, Hearts are the reigning African champions. Indeed four successive league titles, including a "triple" in 2000 of the championship and two cups, have seen Hearts dominate soccer in Ghana in recent times.

The rivalry is further intensified by the fact that Hearts hail from the capital Accra, while Kotoko is based in the country's second largest city, Kumasi, the seat of the traditional Asante kingdom.

December's win, over the heavily-favoured Esperance of Tunisia, made Hearts only the second Ghanaian side to claim the biggest prize in African club football.

It also means they are eligible for the lucrative World Club Championship in Spain in July.

Asante Kotoko were the only previous Ghanaian winners of the African Champions League, taking the title in 1970 and 1983 as well as making it to five other finals between 1967 and 1993.

Kotoko was at the forefront of Ghana's dominance of African football in the late 1950s and early 1960s, providing most of the players for the all-conquering Ghana national team of the era.

"Their achievements are rich and have given them a reputation rarely contested in regional and continental club football," writes journalist Faouzi Mahjoub in his book on the history of African football.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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Ghana Football Association
Hearts of Oak
Asante Kotoko

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