Built in Takla: The Story of Royal Professionals FC

Royal Professionals FC started with a fairly simple idea: there was football talent in and around Takla, and those young players deserved somewhere to develop it.

The club was founded in 2017 in Takla, in Ghana’s Volta Region, by King Alberto Kluson. At the time, the goal was bigger than putting together a team for weekend matches. Kluson wanted to create an environment where young footballers could train seriously, compete and have something positive to work towards.

That idea has guided Royal Professionals ever since.

Starting at home

Takla is home for Royal Professionals, and the connection between the club and the community is important.

It is one of the communities of Asogli State, alongside Ho, Kpenoe and Akoefe, with its own history and traditions. For a young football club, however, Takla offered something else that mattered: young people who loved the game and wanted an opportunity to play.

Royal Professionals began locally, but it did not take long for players from outside Takla to become part of the club.

Speaking about the team in 2022, Kluson said Royal Professionals had attracted players from other parts of Ghana, including Accra, as well as players from neighbouring Togo and Nigeria.

That says quite a bit about what the club was trying to become.

Takla would remain its home, but a player’s hometown would not determine whether he could be given an opportunity.

Taking the club more seriously

There is a big difference between getting a group of talented players together and building a football club that can last.

Royal Professionals began taking those next steps as the club grew.

In April 2022, the club formally unveiled an 11-member board while preparing to compete in Division Three in the Ho Municipality.

The announcement also gave a clearer picture of what the people behind Royal Professionals wanted from the project. Developing good footballers was obviously part of it, but club leadership also spoke about preparing players for life away from the pitch and helping them build skills that would remain useful after their playing days.

For most young players, professional football is a difficult road. Talent matters, but so do consistency, discipline, education, relationships and the ability to handle setbacks.

A smaller club cannot guarantee where football will eventually take a player. What it can do is give him a place to work, improve and be seen.

That is the role Royal Professionals wants to play.

Competing in Volta football

As the club developed, Royal Professionals began appearing in competitions outside its immediate local programme.

In 2023, Takla Royal Professionals competed in the Afe Lotto Volta FA Cup, drawing Volta FF FC in the Central Sector.

For the club, competitions like these are valuable. Players get meaningful matches against different opponents, coaches get a better idea of where the team stands, and the club becomes more connected to the wider football structure in the Volta Region.

The Volta Regional Football Association provides regional clubs with a route into Ghana’s broader football system. For young players in places such as Takla, that pathway can turn local football into something much more serious.

Royal Professionals wants to keep moving along it.

How far can Royal Professionals go?

The people running the club have never been particularly shy about their long-term target.

In 2022, management identified reaching the Ghana Premier League as an ambition for Royal Professionals.

Nobody around the club expects that to happen overnight.

Moving through Ghanaian football means winning matches and developing better players, but it also means improving coaching, administration, facilities, recruitment and finances. Sponsorship becomes more important. Travel becomes more expensive. Expectations increase.

There will be good seasons and difficult ones along the way.

But the fact that the destination is a long way away does not make it the wrong destination.

Royal Professionals was founded in 2017. Five years later, it was preparing for Division Three competition with a formal board in place. The following year, it was competing in the Volta FA Cup.

Those are modest steps when viewed individually, but they are real ones.

What comes next

There is still plenty of work ahead.

Royal Professionals wants to find and develop more players, improve the environment around the team, compete at higher levels and build relationships with organizations that believe in what the club is trying to do.

There is also a responsibility to the young footballers who come through the club.

Some may eventually play at a much higher level. Others may take a completely different path. Either way, the years they spend at Royal Professionals should mean something.

For the people who started the club in Takla, that has been part of the point from the beginning.

Royal Professionals FC is still a young club. Its biggest chapters have not been written yet.

For now, the work continues in Takla.