Marked for Jonathan Afful
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market5 Jul 2027
Enyimba come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Ashanti Gold did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad5 Jul 2027
Isaac Hemans in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ashanti Gold this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Jul 2027
At 21, Araphat Mohammed is already the best thing here
An average of 7.00 in a first team he is several years too young for. Ashanti Gold have something, and by now the whole division has noticed.
Squad5 Jul 2027
Words at Ashanti Gold training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mustafa Yahaya is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad5 Jul 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Fred Dabanka, and the manager let it.
Boardroom5 Jul 2027
Ashanti Gold sign 6 boys into the academy
None of them will be seen by anybody outside the training ground for three years, most of them will never play a senior match, and one of them might change the club. That is the whole proposition, and it is why academies exist.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market7 Jun 2027
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Ashanti Gold, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad7 Jun 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ashanti Gold this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Jun 2027
He is 21, he is averaging 7.00, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad10 May 2027
Trevor Spangenberg damages knee ligaments — 41 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 41 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Squad10 May 2027
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 37 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad10 May 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ashanti Gold this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad12 Apr 2027
71 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Ashanti Gold lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad12 Apr 2027
Anderson Asiedu was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad12 Apr 2027
He is 21, he is averaging 7.00, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad15 Mar 2027
101 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Ashanti Gold lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Match13 Mar 2027
Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 3‑0 against Liberty Professionals, and it could have been more.
Player ratings15 Mar 2027
A brace, and Araphat Mohammed takes the afternoon — 8.40
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Araphat Mohammed provided it, and the 8.40 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings15 Mar 2027
Kutlwano Letlhaku, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 8.22
A mark of 8.22 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Match13 Mar 2027
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 10 matches without defeat is a foundation Ashanti Gold did not have in the autumn.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Kutlwano Letlhaku was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad15 Mar 2027
A season average of 7.01 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Ashanti Gold know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Edwin Gyimah falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The terraces15 Mar 2027
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Kutlwano Letlhaku has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad15 Feb 2027
133 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Ashanti Gold lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
No sign of nerves from Kutlwano Letlhaku at 20 — 8.49
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Kutlwano Letlhaku did not need any: 8.49, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Kutlwano Letlhaku was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Match13 Feb 2027
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Ashanti Gold did not have in the autumn.
Match13 Feb 2027
A 3‑1 win over Wa All Stars, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Words at Ashanti Gold training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hakim Sulemana is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
Successful dribbles: 20. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The terraces15 Feb 2027
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Squad15 Feb 2027
The manager makes an example of Gladwin Shitolo
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.86, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Defences have started doubling up on Thomas Schlupp
18 goals and a season average of 7.45 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Kutlwano Letlhaku was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Boardroom18 Jan 2027
13 days since the seat came open, a list of names doing the rounds, and nobody has signed anything. Every week this drags on the shortlist gets shorter.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Edwin Gyimah falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad18 Jan 2027
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Loan watch18 Jan 2027
“I watch every Ashanti Gold game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at New Edubiase United runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.