Gor Mahia head coach Charles Akonnor during an interview with the Daily Nation in Nairobi on November 5, 2025.
Gor Mahia will host AFC Leopards on Sunday from 4pm at the Nyayo National Stadium in the 98th league meeting between the two arch-rivals.
The rescheduled Mashemeji derby was initially set to be played at Moi International Sports Centre, Kasarani last Sunday, but the venue was unavailable, and efforts to play the fixture a day earlier at Nyayo Stadium did not bear fruit due to the same reason.
The venue change will see the Mashemeji derby played in December for the second time in history.
The first time this happened was on December 16, 1973, with AFC Leopards claiming a 2-1 victory at City Stadium. While AFC Leopards hope lightning will strike twice, Sunday’s clash will add a chapter to the Ghanaian connection in Kenya’s biggest club meeting.
Shariff Musa of Gor Mahia celebrates his goal against Kenya Police during a Kenyan Premier League at Ulinzi Sports Complex in Nairobi on June 22, 2025.
Ghanaian football is loaded with players and coaches named Charles. But it was AFC Leopards’ and Gor Mahia’s embrace of pan-Africanism and ambition to conquer African football that brought two of the most illustrious Charles of Ghanaian football to the Kenyan top-flight league as coaches. The two men – both nicknamed ‘CK’ – are Charles Kumi Gyamfi and Charles Kwabla Akonnor.
Gyamfi, who died in September 2025 aged 85, coached AFC Leopards from 1988 to 1991. A revered figure in Ghanaian football, Gyamfi arrived at Ingwe after the club had suffered a humiliating 7-2 aggregate loss to Al Ahly of Egypt in a 1987 African Cup of Champions Clubs (now CAF Champions League) second round tie. “When AFC Leopards lost heavily to Al Ahly, the then Chairman, Alfred Sambu, fired the British coach Graham Williams and vowed to employ a successful African coach,” a 2011 issue of Ingwe Magazine wrote.
Incidentally, Gyamfi's previous association with Kenyan football was masterminding Ghana’s 13-2 win over Harambee Stars on December 11, 1965. The loss is the second-worst suffered by Kenya in international football.
Gyamfi fit the profile of a successful African coach. At the time, he was the only coach who had won three African Cup of Nations titles — in 1963, 1965, and 1982. His record was later equalled by the Egyptian Hassan Shehata, who led the Pharaohs to Afcon triumphs in 2006, 2008, and 2010.
With Gyamfi, AFC Leopards won the league unbeaten in 1988, marking the Ghanaian’s triumphant return to coaching after a four-year sabbatical. They defended their title in 1989.
AFC Leopards celebrate a goal against Mathare United in a Kenyan Premier League match at Nyayo National Stadium on November 2, 2025.
Gor Mahia wrested the league title from AFC Leopards in 1990 and retained it in 1991, marking Gyamfi’s final season with Ingwe.
Gyamfi faced Gor Mahia eight times, winning twice, drawing four times, and losing twice. His first Mashemeji derby ended in a 0-0 draw.
Another ‘CK’ of Ghanaian football is now handling Gor Mahia.
Though he is yet to match Gyamfi’s achievements in Ghanaian football, Akonnor has enjoyed a commendable career as a player and a coach. He captained Ghana at the youth and senior levels and later coached the Black Stars. He was the captain of the Ghana U-20 squad that lost 2-1 to Brazil in the final of the 1993 Fifa U-20 World Cup. He later captained Ghana at the 1996 Olympic Games and at Afcon 2000. He earned 51 caps for the Black Stars before coaching them from 2020 to 2021 after serving a year as the assistant coach.
He was named Gor Mahia’s coach in August 2025, an appointment that ended his four-year sabbatical from coaching that started with his sacking as Ghana’s coach.
Akonnor’s entry into Kenyan football was welcomed with jokes of Gor Mahia being nicknamed “Ghana Embassy FC”. Gor Mahia also hired Akonnor’s three compatriots – assistant coach Bismark Kobi-Mensah, goalkeeper coach Ben Owu, and video analyst Joshua Kofi Boafo – and signed two Ghanaian players, Ebenezer Adukwaw and George Amonno, to join their countryman, Enock Morrison, who joined last year.
Previous Ghanaian players at Gor include, Taofiq Zachary, who left in June 2015 after a six-month stint, and Francis Afriyie, who gave his services for half a year before departing in January 2020.
AFC Leopards coach Fred Ambani during press conference on March 28, 2025 ahead of the Mashemeji derby.
AFC Leopards have also had Ghanaian players in the past, including Gyamfi’s son Patrick, who featured when his father was the coach.
“Patrick scored some memorable goals, including the strike in the 1-0 win over Kisumu MOW in the 1989 Moi Golden Cup quarter-finals. Patrick is based in the US and is a Facebook friend of many of his colleagues at Leopards,” Ingwe Magazine wrote in a 2011 issue.
Other Ghanaians who played for AFC Leopards are Gilbert Fiamenyo and Eric Bekoe. Fiamenyo spent one year at the club after joining in August 2016. Bekoe joined AFC Leopards in January 2018 and left three months later.
On Sunday, as the count of Ghanaians involved in the Mashemeji derby grows, Akonnor, who was born exactly 10 years after AFC Leopards was founded on March 12, 1964, will be hoping to succeed where Gyamfi failed – winning in his first Mashemeji derby league match.
The 98 league meetings between AFC Leopards and Gor Mahia have produced 172 goals, but none by a Ghanaian player. Will that change on Sunday?
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