Uganda Cranes head coach Milutin Sredojevic has revealed that next month’s AFCON qualifier with Niger should produce the best product on the final day of the campaign. Sredojevic has named a squad of 33 players to start preparations for the fixture. FUFA Communications caught up with the coach and shared his thoughts.
Two parts of the group in the campaign
First of all, I need to say before even starting this qualifier we knew there were two parts in this group; one is Algeria the run-away leaders and the second one is Tanzania and Niger. Now Niger is out of contention due to points and us (Uganda) and Tanzania are perfectly still in. We have a perfect chance that if we win against Niger, we qualify for the AFCON.
The campaign needs a good product on the final day
It is all about the final product. It is a campaign that we entered in an enormous risk with a transitional squad that has nine players from the finalists of AFCON U20 in Mauritania, 2021 with only few senior players and four survivors from the team of 2019 when we played AFCON, that is Emma Okwi, Khalid Aucho, Faruku Miya and Joseph Ochaya. (Salim Jamal was also in Egypt for the AFCON 2019 Finals).
From the 33 players summoned for the AFCON Qualifier against Niger, we shall select 23 players who are in the best competitive shape for the match on 7 th September 2023 in Morocco. It will be exactly 10 years since we played in the same stadium against Senegal in World Cup qualifiers. Now we are going with a different intention to play in the AFCON.
The return of senior players
Bevis Mugabi is back, Timothy Awany has returned, Isaac Mulume and Joseph Ochaya are also in. We have new inclusions consisting of the New York Red Bulls duo Kasule Ibrahim and Sebufu Frank and the rest of the players that we have in Uganda in a competitive way. We shall go all out in attack. The intention is to win.
Buganda Regional tour, international friendly lined up
The locally based players excluding those currently occupied with club activities will play a regional tour match in Luwero on 19th August 2023 and then return to their clubs. The selected local-based players will then return to the camp on 28th August 2023 for Uganda Crane’s duty against Niger. On September 2nd, we are looking forward to an international friendly match for the local based players to test them.
Uganda Cranes to play Niger in Morocco
The team will assemble in Marrakech, Morocco on September 3rd and 4th. There will be three training sessions on the 4th, 5th and 6th of September. Behind us are two months of hard work to ensure that the players are in the best shape. The young players have to follow the senior players while the senior players have to show leadership to the young.
