Uganda Cranes takes on their arch-rivals Harambee Stars of Kenya in the anticipated thrilling finals of this year’s Cecafa-Tusker Cup this evening at Mandela National Stadium, Namboole.
The two sides played the official opening match of the tournament on Nov ember 24 with Uganda Cranes edging the visitors 1-0. Kenya struggled into the finals after dumping Zanzibar 4-2 on spot kicks. Their normal time had ended 2-2.
Uganda Cranes goes into today’s finals with an advantage record of having conceded no goal against the eleven the team has scored in five games they have so far played.
Uganda opened up their title campaign with a 1-0 victory over Kenya, edged Ethiopia on the same margin before walloping South Sudan 4-0 in their last group stage match. In the Quarter finals, the hosts still played Ethiopia as second best losers who conceded 2 unanswered goals.
Next in their way was Tanzania who also failed to match the Cranes performance when they lost 3-0 in the semi finals. Tanzania now plays Zanzibar in their third place match to decide the winner of the USD 10.000 prize.
The Uganda-Kenya game will be played at 6:00pm. Thiery Nkurunziza (Burundi) will be the centre referee assisted by Mussie Kinde (Ethiopia) and Mohamad Idam (Sudan). The standby referee is Mohamed El Fadil from Sudan and Tariq Atta (Sudan) is the match commissioner.
The winner walks away with a cash prize of USD 30.000 with another USD 20.000 going to the losing team. The tournament is sponsored by East African Breweries limited (EABL) through Tusker, one of their favourite brands.
In 2009, Kenya lost to Uganda 1-0 in the finals of the same tournament.
