Accra Hearts of Oak will represent Ghana in next season’s CAF Champions League after winning the league this season.
Hearts’ first league title since 2009 handed them Ghana’s sole spot in the competition for the next campaign.
Despite winning the league title in 2009, the Phobians last played in the competition in 2008, when they were eliminated in the preliminary round by Gabonese side, FC Libreville.
Hearts of Oak opted out of the 2009-10 CAF Champions League, citing financial constraints as the main reason.
“We took a number of factors into consideration but finance was a major issue,” the club’s Vice President at the time, Frank Nelson, told KickOffGhana.com.
Following an impressive league campaign that currently sees them four points clear of Ghana’s last representatives in the competition, Asante Kotoko, with one match to play, Hearts will feel confident about their chances of a good run in the Champions League.
Kotoko have represented Ghana at the last two tournaments and have been to seven AFCON tournaments since Hearts’ last appearance.
Hearts won the competition back in 2000 which remains their only success in Africa’s top club competition.
The Phobians, however, also claimed a CAF Confederation Cup trophy and the CAF Super Cup in that decade.
Hearts beat Kotoko to the title with a game to spare, ending their 11-year wait for a trophy and they will be hoping to end their much longer drought in African club competitions when the Champions League begins later this year.