Hearts of Oak mark 108th birthday, cut sod for Pobiman Academy

Accra Hearts of Oak’s 108th birthday present to itself will be the sod cutting of their Pobiman Academy project.

The event will be the follow-through on the agreement signed between the club and Turkish construction company, Prefabex Yapi Teknolojileri San Ve Tic Ltd. (STL) in August this year.

The Pobiman Project, when completed, will house a staff residence, senior housing unit, gym training centres (pitches), laundry, swimming pool, lockers, toilet facilities, kitchen, and dining hall.

The land for the project was acquired almost a decade ago however the lack of funds has delayed the start of the construction.

The project has been part of the club’s plans for years now but a challenge with funding had always help things up until the team’s former CEO, Mark Noonan, did his best to take things further and start some work on the project.

It is known when the project will be completed but Hearts are hopeful that they will be able to finish work and put the project to good use.

Happy birthday to Hearts

The club was set up in 1911 and they have 20 Ghana Premier League titles to their name as well as 10 FA Cup crowns together with the 2000 CAF Champions League and the 2004 CAF Confederation Cup.

Their fans have been celebrating the birthday with some goodwill messages on social media in response to a Twitter post by the club on Monday.

Good times

After struggling to win the continent’s biggest club competition in 1977 and 1979, Hearts got it right in 2000 when they defeated Esperance of Tunisia 4-2 on aggregate in a two-legged final.

They beat the Tunisians 2-1 in the away leg they had to overcome an Esperance goal in Accra and some crowd trouble to win the second leg 3-1 and clinch their first CAF Champions League crown.

In 2001, they won the CAF Super Cup in Kumasi after defeating Zamalek 2-0 at the Baba Yara Stadium.

In January 2005, they went past Asante Kotoko 8-7 on penalties to win the inaugural CAF Confederation Cup title. The two-legged final ended 2-2 and penalties were needed to find the winner.