Ghana Premier League new boys Tamale City has blamed their poor start after the opening day loss to the short time afforded them to prepare for the elite division.

Tamale City emerged winners of a three team playoff that was to replace demoted Ashantigold who have been found culpable of match fixing.

The Northern Region based side lost 1-0 against Karela at Anyinase in their opening day clash prompting assistant coach of the side Hamza Mohamed to blame the short time they had to prepare for the season.

“Because we qualified late, we didn’t get enough time to prepare and that’s is affecting us” he told Union FM in an interview

“We were thinking GFA will give us some special dispensation to prepare adequately, but they did not”

“We were not satisfied with our preparations prior to the league but we won’t dwell on that and fail”

Meanwhile, Hamza Mohammed has vowed Tamale City will fight to maintain their status in the league at the end of season.

“We have a target of helping Tamale City avoid relegation and that is our target for now,”

"Our ultimate target is to stay in the league and improve our standings. We want to play good football which will attract the fans to the stadium to watch our matches,” he added.

Tamale City takes on Legon Cities in matchday two of the Ghana Premier League at the Aliu Mahama Stadium in Tamale.