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Caf Women’s Champions League: Kawempe in fair qualification draw
Kawempe Muslim midfIelder Krusum Namutebi. PHOTO/JOHN BATANUDDE
What you need to know:
The draws were held on Wendesday in Cairo, Egypt by Cecafa’s women football manager and former Crested Cranes midfielder Jean Sseninde.
Kawempe Muslim coach Ayub Khalifa believes he has avoided some of the main antagonists ahead of the August 17 to September 4 Cecafa region’s Caf Women’s Champions League qualifiers.
The draws were held on Wendesday in Cairo, Egypt by Cecafa’s women football manager and former Crested Cranes midfielder Jean Sseninde.
Central Bank of Ethiopia (CBE), who have been a nearly side for three editions, were drawn in Group A as hosts and were joined by Kenya Police Bullets, South Sudan’s Yei Joint Stars, Zanzibar’s Warriors Queens and Rwanda’s Rayon Sports.
Kawempe Muslim were drawn in Group B, which has 2022 champions Simba Queens, PVP Buyenzi from Burundi and FAD Djibouti.
“I think it would have been harder if we had Simba and then the Kenyans or the Ethiopians and the Kenyans,” Khalifa said after the draw.
“So it might be the fairest draw we could have gotten. Let us see how things pan out in the tournament,” he added.
Preparations
Khalifa’s sides might be record champions in Uganda but they are debutants at this level. The only two advantages they take into the tournament are that most of the opponents will be familiar faces to him from the time he was U-17 and U-20 national teams coach. And then some of his players like Samalie Nakacwa and Hadijah Nandago had the chance of playing the competition while on loan with Kampala Queens last year.
Another one could be Shakirah Nyinagahirwa but she could be sidelined for a while after belatedly undergoing surgery in June for a troublesome knee injury.
Kawempe will travel to Rwanda to face Rayon Sports on August 3 in a preparation friendly. That is as far as their preparations go as Khalifa has struggled to beef up his squad in the ongoing transfer window.
“We still have some time and we are open to adding any value, even if the player is from outside the country. But for now, all the deals we have tried to chase have fallen through,” Khalifa shared.
