Akwasi Asante

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Akwasi Asante
Personal information
Full name Akwasi Asante[1]
Date of birth (1992-09-06) 6 September 1992 (age 31)
Place of birth Amsterdam, Netherlands
Height Script error: No such module "person height".
Position(s) Striker
Team information
Current team
 Solihull Moors
Youth career
1999-2003 Neerlandia/SLTO
2003-2005 Blauw-Wit Amsterdam
2005 HFC Haarlem
2006–2008 Wednesbury Sports Union
2008–2011 Birmingham City
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
2011–2014 Birmingham City 0 (0)
2012 → Northampton Town (loan) 4 (1)
2013 → Shrewsbury Town (loan) 7 (1)
2013 → Shrewsbury Town (loan) 1 (0)
2014–2015 Kidderminster Harriers 10 (0)
2015– Solihull Moors 31 (13)
*Club domestic league appearances and goals, correct as of 10:17, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

Akwasi Asante (born 6 September 1992) is a Dutch footballer who plays as a striker for National League North club Solihull Moors.

Asante began his senior career in England with Birmingham City. He made his first-team debut in the Europa League play-off round second leg against C.D. Nacional in August 2011, and made his debut in the Football League while on loan at Northampton Town in January 2012. He had spells on loan at Shrewsbury Town in both 2012–13 and 2013–14, but injury disrupted his progress, and he left Birmingham when his contract expired. Without a club while recovering from injury, he spent the latter part of the 2014–15 season with Kidderminster Harriers before moving on to Solihull Moors.

Club career

Early life and career

Asante was born in Amsterdam to Ghanaian parents.[2] He played at amateur club Neerlandia, which then merged with two other clubs to form Blauw-Wit Amsterdam.[3] As a youngster he had interested Ajax, but he chose to join HFC Haarlem's youth academy, where he spent three years before the family moved to the UK when he was 13. He played for Wednesbury Sports Union in the Walsall Junior Youth League before joining Birmingham City F.C.'s Academy, where he began a two-year scholarship in July 2009.[2][4][5]

In the 2010–11 season, Birmingham chose not to enter a reserve team in a competitive league, but Asante was a regular member of the under-18 Academy team and played in the Birmingham Senior Cup. In October 2010 he scored five goals as the under-18s beat Tottenham Hotspur's under-18s 6–0.[4] This performance contributed to his first competitive involvement with the first team a few days later, when he was named among the substitutes for the Football League Cup fourth-round tie against Brentford.[4] Asante signed his first professional contract, of two-and-a-half years, in January 2011.[6] Injury kept him out for four months,[7] but he was an unused substitute for Birmingham's last two Premier League games of the season, against Fulham and Tottenham Hotspur.[8]

Senior football

He was part of the Birmingham squad for their 2011 pre-season visit to Ireland, and came close to scoring in the second half of the friendly against Cork City, when he appeared to be brought down after touching the ball past the goalkeeper, but no penalty was awarded.[9] In the absence through injury of strikers Cameron Jerome, Marlon King and Nikola Žigić,[10] Asante was named in the 20-man squad for Birmingham's Europa League match against Nacional in Madeira in August. An unused substitute in the first leg,[11] he made his first-team debut in the second leg on 25 August, replacing Chris Burke in the 88th minute as Birmingham won 3–0 to qualify for the group stage.[12]

On 1 January 2012, Asante moved to Northampton Town of Football League Two on a one-month loan deal.[13] He went straight into the starting eleven for their match the following day, away to Shrewsbury Town, and after 22 minutes he collected a cross from Lewis Young and rounded the goalkeeper to set up the opening goal for Saido Berahino. The match finished as a 1–1 draw.[14] In his second game for the club, he "took advantage of a slip by his marker to carry the ball inside another challenge and smack a right-footed shot inside Barry Roche's near post", his first league goal which proved to be the winner as Northampton beat Morecambe 2–1.[15] He returned to Birmingham at the end of the month having scored once from three appearances.[16]

Asante was part of the Birmingham squad that went on a tour to Austria ahead of the 2012–13 season.[17] He was preferred to Žigić for the visit of Bolton Wanderers in September because manager Lee Clark wanted a striker with pace available among the substitutes if needed.[18] He tore a hamstring playing for the development squad in October. The injury took considerably longer than expected to heal,[19] and Asante did not return to development squad duty until March 2013.[20] Ahead of the transfer deadline, Asante joined Shrewsbury Town on loan until the end of the League One season,[21] and made his debut as a late substitute in a 2–2 draw away to Carlisle United. In seven games for Shrewsbury he scored once, the third goal in a 3–2 defeat of Portsmouth on the last day of the season.[22]

Asante signed a new one-year contract with Birmingham in June 2013, with an option for the club to extend it for a second year.[23] He rejoined Shrewsbury on loan, initially for a month, ahead of the 2013–14 season.[24] A hamstring injury delayed his second debut for the club until the fourth match of the season, a 2–0 win at home to Swindon Town.[25] Birmingham recalled Asante on 19 August as cover, with two strikers injured and another free to leave the club.[26] However, injury prevented his involvement in Birmingham's next match and disrupted his season.[27] He returned to action in April 2014 with four goals in a development squad match against Huddersfield Town, leading manager Lee Clark to suggest he might still have a future at the club,[28] but it was later confirmed that he would leave when his contract expired at the end of the season.

Kidderminster Harriers

Asante was without a club for some months while recovering from injury. On 16 December 2014, he signed for Conference Premier club Kidderminster Harriers until the end of the season.[29] He made his debut as a second-half substitute as Kidderminster beat Lincoln City with a goal in stoppage time,[30] and finished his spell with 11 appearances without scoring.[8]

Solihull Moors

He then moved on to National League North club Solihull Moors, for whom he appeared regularly, as starter or substitute in about equal measure.[8]

Career statistics

As of match played 15 March 2016
Club Season League FA Cup League Cup Other Total
Division Apps Goals Apps Goals Apps Goals Apps Goals Apps Goals
Birmingham City 2011–12[31] Championship 0 0 0 0 0 0 1[lower-alpha 1] 0 1 0
2012–13[22] Championship 0 0 0 0 0 0 — 0 0
Total 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0
Northampton Town (loan) 2011–12[31] League Two 4 1 — — — 4 1
Shrewsbury Town (loan) 2012–13[22] League One 7 1 — — — 7 1
2013–14[32] League One 1 0 — 0 0 — 1 0
Total 8 1 — — — 8 1
Kidderminster Harriers 2014–15[8] Conference Premier 10 0 — — 1[lower-alpha 2] 0 11 0
Solihull Moors 2015–16[8][33] National League North 31 13 3 2 — 5[lower-alpha 3] 2 39 17
Career total 53 15 3 2 0 0 7 2 63 19
  1. ↑ Appearance in UEFA Europa League
  2. ↑ Appearances in FA Trophy
  3. ↑ Three appearances and one goal in FA Trophy, two appearances and one goal in Birmingham Senior Cup

References

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  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  5. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  6. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 8.4 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. Cite error: Invalid <ref> tag; name "Soccerway" defined multiple times with different content
  9. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  10. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  13. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  14. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  15. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  16. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  17. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  18. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  19. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  20. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  21. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  22. ↑ 22.0 22.1 22.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  23. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  24. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  25. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  26. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  27. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  28. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  29. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  30. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  31. ↑ 31.0 31.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  32. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  33. ↑ For cup matches not covered by Soccerway: Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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External links

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