Kateregga: I always fight for, earn my playing place

What you need to know:

SOCCER. The Cape Town City midfielder, who has just ended his loan spell at Maritzburg United, helped the latter maintain PSL status and is now intent on making it to Egypt with Cranes for Afcon

Allan Kateregga, in full flow, is a real Dancing Rasta.
Waves of that have been seen during his time at AFC Leopards, KCCA, in South Africa and for Uganda Cranes, in the 2-0 away defeat of Lesotho last October.
Throughout his career from defunct Victoria University in 2012 through six other clubs, with his recent being KCCA and Maritzberg, where he has been on loan from Cape Town City, the 25-year-old has danced through rubble and some fine tunes.
The Dancing Rasta - waves of his dreads as he dats past opponents and eats up miles inspiring the nickname -, is not expecting any easy dances in Abu Dhabi.
“The competition is been tough almost everywhere I have played,” Kateregga, who is preparing with Cranes teammates ahead of Nations Cup finals in Egypt in under three weeks time, told Daily Monitor.

Deserve to be here
“And and I have surprised myself by keeping winning so am sure am up to the task or else I wouldn’t be here in the first place,” added, rather emphatically, the man vying to break into a crowded Cranes midfield.
“It’s an honour to represent my country at any level but a special honor and privilege to be part of the team preparing for Afcon finals in Egypt, it helps me inspire myself to greater heights.”
Kateregga has a chance to further assure Cranes coach Sebastien Desabre he should be on that final 23-man squad to Egypt when Uganda face Turkmenistan in a friendly on Sunday.
He never believed he would be in the position he is in now two years ago when Uganda buried the four-decade absence from the finals, but “here I am now,” he said.
“My goal is to help the country better our performance from the last finals and everything else shall come after that.”
Kateregga was one of the star performers as Uganda completed a double with a 2-0 victory in Lesotho last year, but was ignored against Cape Verde and Tanzania.
“Well,” he said, “That’s what competition at this level does, I guess. But it came as a surprise to me too. I thought I had made a fine tune of myself.”

Maritzburg move timely
The player had an on-and-off start at Cape Town City after his free transfer following the end of his tenure at KCCA a year ago.
A hip injury in his early Cape Town days slowed him down, and when he recovered regular football was hard to come by.
The only logical thing to do, if he wanted to have a chance at playing Afcon in Egypt, was to move elsewhere and Maritzburg couldn’t have come at a better time. “Ending up at Maritzburg was to try and make my Afcon dream a possibility and am glad it has.”
Kateregga, who scored three league goals and made one assist in 15 appearances, helped Martzburg make history by becoming the first club to win all four playoff matches to retain their status as a top flight team.