Asante Kotoko Assistant coach Abdulai Gazale parts ways with the club, seeks new challenge

Ghana Premier League powerhouse Asante Kotoko Assistant coach Abdulai Gazale has left the club with immediate effect ahead of the commencement of the 2023/2024 football season, ghanasportspage.com can confirm.

“I thank the Life Patron of Asante Kotoko, His Royal Majesty Otumfuo Osei Tutu II. My stay in Kotoko has been a rewarding experience working with different people in different capacities, with players, Technical Staffs and people around the club. I am much grateful to be part of the four years journey”, Galzale wrote in a post via his official social media account.

Gazale, a CAF Licence A holder, joined the Porcupine Warriors in December 2019 as first Assistant coach to the then newly appointed head coach of the club, Maxwell Konadu. Gazale arrived along with Konadu when coach Johnson Smith, a CAF Licence B holder, was acting as the club’s interim head coach following the sacking of the Norwegian tactician, Kjetil Zachariassen for bad performance, before the appointment of Maxwell Konadu as substantive head coach on Monday, December 9, 2019.

Having joined the club based on coach Maxwell Konadu’s recommendation, coach Gazale worked with Konadu until the 2011/2012 GPL winner for Asante Kotoko was fired in December 2020 by the club for unfavourable performance. Following the sacking of Maxwell Konadu in December 2020, coach Abdulai Gazale was appointed on December 22, 2020 as interim head coach of the club. He was later on February 8, 2021 confirmed as the head coach of the club (for the purposes of technicalities) as the club was competing in the Ghana Premier League and the CAF Confederation Cup.

Gazale held the interim head coach position of Asante Kotoko until March 2021 when Portuguese coach Mariano Barreto was appointed head coach of the club with Gazale as his first Assistant. Barreto was fired in September 2021 and former WAFA head coach Prosper Narteh Ogum was appointed head coach of Asante Kotoko in September 2021 by the club’s then newly appointed CEO, Nana Yaw Amponsah whose administration would reign until the end of the 2022/2023 football season before its eventual dissolution by the life patron of Asante Kotoko, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II in July 2023.

Abdulai Gazale worked with Ogum as Assistant coach of Asante Kotoko, guiding the club to the premier league title before Ogum left his position in August 2022, with Gazale staying with the club. Ogum was reappointed head coach of Asante Kotoko in July 2023 with Abdulai Gazale still at post as Assistant coach of the club.

As the club is at preseason ahead of the commencement of the 2023/2024 Ghana Premier League season, Gazale believes he has had enough with the Porcupine Warriors and has announced his departure from the club, thanking the Patron and all persons he had worked with at the club during his four years of stay.

According to him, his exit has been necessitated by his quest to seek new challenge elsewhere, where he would put all experiences gathered during his association with Asante Kotoko into a much more challenging test and use for further exploits.

“This is the time to reflect and also to begin fulfilling my ambition to challenge myself with the experience gathered so far”, Gazale stated.

Below is the full statement from Abdulai Gazale as he bids farewell to the Asante Kotoko family.