KCCA could wrap up league title next week

Fresh Impetus. The Kasasiro boys have a point to prove against Fus Rabat. File photo

What you need to know:

Soccer. The defending champions might retain the league title with victories over Vipers today, Express on Friday and JMC next Tuesday

KAMPALA.

The Azam Uganda Premier League (UPL) log structure is now almost settled, with KCCA and SC Villa the lone rangers at the top, JMC assured of Big League football next season, and a cast of about seven teams all still in the fight to beat the drop.

Yet for coach Wasswa Bbosa’s Villa, it was last Saturday’s apparent league decider between the Jogoos and KCCA that all but harboured their remaining title hopes, especially given that they had come into that encounter in Masaka on the back of two defeats.

The back-to-back losses had left Villa in an unenviable position of becoming only the fourth team to beat KCCA in the league this season.

They had to see off KCCA for them to retain more realistic chances of having their own taste at the cherry for the first time since 2004.

But the record-16 champions could only strike late courtesy of Emmanuel Okwi’s 72nd minute penalty, his seventh ninth from only the second round, to rescue a point. “We are obviously happier with the result,” said KCCA manager Mike Mutebi.
After that match, it is still all square on 48 points apiece between KCCA and Villa. Yet that is hardly close to the deeper truth.

Villa have played three matches more than KCCA, and have an inferior goal difference of six, with the latter having seven games left to play.
Bossa had talked of “taking one game at a time” ahead of last Saturday’s encounter and now he has only four matches left to not only challenge KCCA for the title, but ensure third-placed URA, seven points and a game behind, do not displace him.

Early champagne?
Mutebi can wrap up only his second league title as coach of KCCA as early as next week if his side beat Vipers at Lugogo today, Express at Wankulukuku on Friday and JMC next Tuesday.

In the event Villa mathematically delay KCCA’s possible early celebrations with victory over Police – assuming the former have won all their three between today and next Tuesday -, that fight will be buried if the champions beat Kirinya-Jinja on May 6; the same day the Jogoos face Soana.

This is so because even if Villa, who host Police on Friday, equally win their next three games, they can only amass a maximum of 60, while KCCA can garner a supreme 69 if they win all their remaining seven.

Simple mathematics suggests that KCCA need an outright 13 points from the available 21 for them to defend the title.

“We want to get a positive result from every game to get confidence going into another,” said Mutebi yesterday.