Kobs develop sinking feeling

For a very long time, Ugandan rugby has been ruled by two giants, Heathens and Kobs. The two franchises set the pace and more often than not, titles are shared between them.

But Kobs’ returns in the last few years point to a franchise in crisis, with success hard to come by as rivals Heathens keep adding trophies to their cabin.

The Legends outfit last opened their trophy cabin in 2021, when they won the Nile Special Premier League, the National 7s and the Uganda Cup.

Since then, the club have yet to win any major silverware. Heathens have just recently won the National 7s championship to complete the sweep of all three major trophies on offer.

Kobs, on the other hand, could only manage to win one of the seven legs and finished fourth on the log with 99 points.

The poor run from 2021 has one common denominator in Club Chairman Dr. Tonny Stone Luggya, whose leadership has divided opinion amongst the Kobs’ faithful.

“The biggest problem is the policy to keep out National Sevens players from club games. We lost six senior players for almost 14 months,” Luggya told Score in an interview.

Players like Adrian Kasito, Ian Munyani, Pius Ogena, Mark Osuna and Karim Arinaitwe have all been a big part of the Uganda 7s program and missed local action for Kobs.

But that has not only affected Kobs. Both Heathens and Pirates have lost key players in the same period. Aaron Ofoyrwoth, Michael Wokorach and Nobert Okeny have all missed Heathens’ games due to the Uganda 7s schedule.

Pirates have also had to operate largely without Alex Aturinda, Desire Ayera, Mubarak Wandera, William Nkore and Isaac Massa. “Our backline has had to be tinkered with constantly to get experience. We have had to rely on youngsters,” Luggya added.

Near misses

Even with their struggles, Kobs have severally come close to winning but somehow let it slip. Case in point is the 2023 final day collapse that saw Kobs lose 23-07 to relinquish the title to Pirates at Legends.

Kobs simply had to win in front of their home crowd to clinch the title but the defeat saw them drop to third place. “We have had several near misses in there,” back Joseph Aredo said.

“We just need to sort our house, we are clearly not ticking our boxes,” the Rugby Cranes star said without going into detail. Luggya believes the 2023 title would have gone Kobs’ way had so many things not gone against them.

“The officiating debacle of Kyadondo cost the team morale, from a dominant pack the whole season to frustrating calls that cut down the team strength yet opponents got away with similar calls.”

Going into the second round clash at Kyadondo, Kobs topped the table with 55 points and had a chance to create daylight between them and the chasing Heathens.

But a controversial 19-12 win for Heathens, aided by center referee Ronald Wutimba’s last minute penalty try, saw Kobs end the day third on the log.

There was also a coin toss loss to Heathens in the 2022 Uganda Cup semifinal after the two sides had failed to be separated in 110 minutes.

The two also tied on cards and had to be separated by the toss of the coin. Heathens won the toss to reach the final, in which they defeated Pirates for yet another piece of silverware.

Sponsorship challenges

Unfortunately for Luggya, he took over the club at a time when the main sponsor Betway had just left the Ugandan market. Kobs was one of the Ugandan sports franchises to feel the pinch when Betway walked away.

That left the club with a task of finding a new sponsor to fill the financial void left by the betting company.

“Another big factor was losing major sponsor Betway three weeks before my term kicked off. That brought us from good budgets for player facilitation to shoestring budget for Kobs, Boks and our girls so, motivation was affected.”

In 2023, Kobs landed a Shs95m sponsorship package from KCB Bank but that has proven to be a drop in the ocean, compared to the close to Shs350m per season from Betway.

The other sponsorship, which came from Guinness in terms of kit support but, with Nile Special sponsoring the league, the kits could not see the light of day during the season.

Politics

The Kobs camp has been in disarray since Luggya took over, with management and players seemingly divided into different camps. Luggya’s first term saw him oust Isaac Lutwama, who had worked with the club in the previous executive as vice president.

The two years came to an end and the club went back to the polls, Luggya, this time round, edged Jean Claude Rutayisire by five votes to retain his seat for the next two years.

Throughout the Annual General Meeting held at Nob View Hotel, Ntinda in December last year, Luggya was pinned to the wall due to what members termed as incompetence, micro management of the club and failure to come up with a proper financial report.

The close calls in the two elections might point to a healthy democratic competition within the club but it further indicated the presence of camps pulling in different directions.

“Stability in the management side and technical bench. The personnel need some revamping,” Kobs and Rugby Cranes legend Allan Musoke told Score.

“If you noticed, Kobs had the youngest line up during the league for the last, say, six seasons. The rebuild is on,” the former winger revealed.

With both Heathens and Pirates seemingly in a good place at the moment, the onus is on Kobs to level up.