Hearts of Oak coach Frank Nuttall has asked his players to be mentally strong ahead of Sunday's Ghana Premier League derby against rivals Asante Kotoko.

The Phobians go into the match on the back of a 2-1 defeat at Tema Youth on Wednesday.

''The psychology of my players would’t be affected despite our loss to Tema Youth. We have spoken about that already, but there will be a need to have a strong mentality going into the Kotoko game,'' Nuttall said in a post match presser.

''So we’ll see who has got the leadership quality, and from what I have seen so far this season, we have guys in squad we can go and do the job on Sunday.''