Rockets Hockey Open: Local clubs re-draw new battle lines for tourney
Forest of legs. Rockets defender Isaac Oryem alias Boxer dribbles past KHC players in a league meeting last season. PHOTO BY M. MUZIRANSA
KAMPALA.
During the Africa Cup of Club Championship (ACCC) held in Kenya last month, there was a feeling of togetherness among Ugandan clubs.
The desperate Wananchi and Weatherhead men and ladies’ sides went for desperate measures, that included borrowing players from other sides, as they attempted to make a mark at the continental stage; they dreadfully failed.
But this weekend at Lugogo Hockey Grounds, there will be no borrowing players or cheering rivals as all five clubs battle to win the resuscitated Rockets Open.
The only changes from last season’s squads will be facilitated by transfers.
For the four Wananchi and Weatherhead teams, that return to ACCC later this year as 2016 MPL National Hockey League champions and runners up respectively, have to show they learned more from Kenya, where they helped opponents pile statistics. The four teams conceded a combined 114 goals (nearly half of the 248 that were scored at the tournament), scoring just 24 in 19 games.
Kampala Hockey Club (KHC) men and Weatherhead women, who hold the most cups in the last three years, will both hope to win their six Open in 14 competitions.
Rockets, the hosts, believe there is pressure on them too to revive their lost luster yet you cannot underestimate the element of surprise that can spring from Simba and Deliverance Church, who have both won two of the past 13 competitions for men and women respectively.
