Woe unto Lady Cranes

Sep 07, 2011

The Rugby Lady Cranes will have to wait another four years before they can think of qualifying for the World Cup rugby sevens again due to financial constraints.

BY USHER KOMUGISHA

The Rugby Lady Cranes will have to wait another four years before they can think of qualifying for the World Cup rugby sevens again due to financial constraints.

The women were the first Ugandan team to go to a World Cup (January 2009 in Dubai) but they have since missed out on the international scene.

According to the game’s country manager, Jacob Bukenya, the Uganda Rugby Union (URU) does not have enough money to send a 12-person team with three officials to this year’s Confederation of African Rugby (CAR) tournament due to take place in Botswana next month - a qualifying platform for the 2013 women’s sevens world cup in Moscow, Russia.

Bukenya said: “URU chose to honour the invitation extended by the Reunion Islands in June where the ladies came third but unfortunately this strained our budget.”

Reunion provided return air tickets for the side while URU met the feeding and accommodation costs for the side that overwhelmed Mayotte Islands, the French Navy and Madagascar in the group stages before they fell to the French U-20 side in the semi-finals.

An emotional ladies’ coach Anthony Kinene expressed his frustration, “Rugby sevens needs consistency to build confidence and team bonding but if we cannot do that then we shall keep struggling. I would have loved to see them compete on the continent.”

Uganda had been drawn in Pool B with Kenya, Botswana and Madagascar.

The top four teams from the tournament will meet eight other teams from north and west Africa for a qualification event that will see four teams advance to the 2012 women’s 15s rugby World Cup in London.

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