African Kings | Part 10 | An Enforced Backwards Step

A few jobs were available immediately, so he applied for vacancies in Egypt, South Africa, Tanzania and Tunisia. It took ages for any of those clubs to even muster a response, but the Egyptian and South African sides didn’t even offer an interview, before getting a call from Tanzania, where the fans immediately made him a “leading candidate.” But the board didn’t agree, instead choosing a local manager with a worse reputation and attributes, which had Mahtal pretty concerned about his job prospects. That forced him back into the market, eventually getting interviews and offers from clubs in Libya, Namibia and Niger. And the best of a bad bunch took Mahtal to Niger.

Who Are AS Police (NER)?

Association Sportive Police is a semi-professional club based in the Niger capital Niamey. The club was founded in 1993 and is sponsored by the Nigerien National Police. AS Police enjoyed a superb season in 2007/8, when it won both the Nigerien league title, which is ranked as the 34th best league in Africa, and the national cup. However, it’s not won anything since then. AS Police play at the 5,000-capacity Stade Municipal de Niamey but doesn’t have a training ground, has basic youth and training facilities and the finances are an unmitigated disaster – so this felt like a substantial backwards step. However, Mahtal felt he had to take the offer when it arrived and was excited by the opportunity to work in a new country.

AS Police had an overload of centre backs, led by star players Abdoul Kader Coulibaly and Sadissou Darenkoum, and holding midfielders with their only striker being 18-year-old Saidu Darenkoum. Other key players will be young midfielders Abdel Jelil Rachid Samal Moussa, who obviously needed the nickname Abdi because that name was a joke, and Khaled Moussa, along with wing back Abdoulaye Adebayor. They also had a few exciting 16-year-olds in midfielder Zakariou Ibrahim Mahamadou, attacker Amadou Dermane and centre back Hamadou Soumaila. Despite having no scouting team, a strong recommendation came in and Mahtal snapped up Nigerian striker Isa Nasir on a free transfer.

Given the quantity of defensive players in the squad, Mahtal went with a solid 3-4-3 approach that looked to exploit the centre of the pitch and leave width for the wing backs. He decided on a more direct style that looked to pass into space, counter and regroup out of possession with the aim of being as solid as possible.

A Slow Start in Niger

The Nigerien bookies had AS Police down to finish 8th in the Super Ligue with title odds of 50/1, which Mahtal felt was a little harsh. AS FAN are 6/5 favourites along with US GN (2/1), AS Douanes (13/1), AS GNN (18/1), NIGELEC (20/1), Sahel SC (25/1) and AS SONIDEP (33/1). The board only wanted a mid-table finish, but a 2-1 away win over AS FAN in a pre-season testimonial gave Mahtal reason for optimism.

As is customary with African leagues, the Nigerien Super Ligue didn’t kick off until late October. Mahtal’s reign began with a trip to SONIDEP and a solid defensive effort earned a pretty turgid 0-0, before his home debut was slightly more entertaining as Nasir’s first goal earned a 1-1 with GNN. They suffered a really poor 4-1 defeat at NIGELEC before midfielder Ocean Jogi earned a cagey first win, 1-0 at home to Tagour, and repeated the feat at home to Renaissance. And Saidu’s first goal earned the same result at home to Racing Niamey – that’s 3 consecutive 1-0 home wins!

An intriguing clash took the Police to early pacesetters Gendarmerie Nationale (GN) and they got trounced 3-1 to trail the leaders by a huge 16 points, albeit with 3 games in hand. But the struggles continued, including only drawing with struggling UAM, to sit just 4 points above the dropzone heading into a month-long break.

Mahtal tweaked the approach, pushing Coulibaly up into midfield and bringing youngster Mahamadou into attacking midfield. But that didn’t help their fortunes as they began 2036 with home defeats to Douanes and FAN, before a 2-0 loss at Espoir Zinder. A new signing arrived in young Nigerian striker Okechukwu Okocha, which allowed Nasir to drop back into midfield, and that shift ended a 6-game winless streak with Nasir scoring the only goal at Sahel before nicking the same result at bottom side Liberté and a 2-1 win over Jangorzo lifted them to the heady heights of 6th.

However, they simply couldn’t compete with the teams at the top of the table and another poor run of form, including a new club record 6 games without scoring, saw them drop back into mid-table mediocrity. Albeit, a decent finish, including Okocha scoring the only goal at Niamey, helped them finish in a respectable 6th place. AS Police finished a massive 31 points behind winners GN with 10 wins, 11 draws and 9 defeats, scoring just 29 and conceding 35.

A Wasted Season of Regression

A lack of goals was highlighted by new boy Okocha top-scoring with 10 goals in 21 games. Jogi and Nasir were the only other players to score more than twice and only four players got more than 2 assists.

Mahtal was certain taking this job had been a mistake as his reputation had somehow fallen to local from a solid regional. Furthermore, a mass of his star players were out of contract in the summer, as was he, and didn’t want to renew their deals and the club was in an untenable financial hole over £340k in the red with a £380k debt. He saw no point in extending his contract beyond the end of June, and decided to walk away with the aim of fixing his reputation more than 10 years into the adventure.

Where would Mahtal end up as he went in search of his 10th club? Join us on Friday to find out!