Cranes na Mutima gives northern players hope

By Jackson Kitara and Swalley Kenyi

Northern Uganda 0
Uganda Cranes 5

October 11: Africa Nations
Cup qualifier
Uganda v Togo

Uganda Cranes humiliated the Northern Uganda select team 5-0 in a friendly match but the vanquished coach looked on the positive side and said that he hopes the national team’s visit will inspire young people in the area to take football seriously.

Michael Aloya stressed that interacting with Cranes stars would have a good effect on his players who always look up to the national team players as their idols.

“If I am to rate my team out of 10, I can rate them at four only but the coming of the national team to northern Uganda will encourage players in the region to train very hard to excel. Normally the players in Gulu just hear of the national stars or watch them on television. But now they are interacting with them which is very encouraging in terms of career growth,” Aloya said.

Karim Ndugwa, William Wadri, a brace by Saidi Kyeyune and an own goal by Richard Langoya completed the score.

Aloya attributed the huge defeat to inadequate training since the match was fixed at short notice.

“We got the notice for the friendly match on Wednesday and trained for only three days. I request that next time FUFA should give us information early so that we prepare and train enough,” Aloya said.

Cranes coach Micho Sredojevic said the friendly was one of many others to come as part of the Nile Breweries-sponsored ‘Cranes na Mutima’ campaign in a bid to build the national team fan base.

“This was also an opportunity for home based players to fight for places on the senior national team as we prepare to play against Togo in the 2015 Nations Cup campaign next week,” Sredojevic said.

He added that such engagements will help in selecting players for the CECAFA U-23 championship due in November and the All Africa Games qualifier against Mozambique.

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