Onduparaka give dose of what to expect
Onduparaka fans turned up in droves to support their Arua-based team in the Big League Championship final against Jinja SS - Kirinya at Nakivubo Stadium. Photo by Eddie Chicco
What you need to know:
Soccer. As former Maroons coach Asaph Mwebaze alluded, the lesson for other clubs with upcountry connections is to relocate their teams to those areas so as to have a genuine fan base - the true lifeblood of any team.
The Dee Jay at Nakivubo on Sunday seemed to have read the mood easily, throwing in Lingala tunes to send the already hyperactive Caterpillar fans in the Kirussia into unconfined bliss.
In their thousands, they sung from the moment their team and Kirinya Jinja SS came out for warm-ups, decibels raising notches as their own dissolved into the changing rooms.
The merrymaking continued as both teams walked back onto the pitch. Some hundreds of Jinja fans, not once, found their voices swallowed up; their attempted noises fizzled out by the red-and-green flag waving army from West Nile.
Some had obviously flocked in from Arua Park and areas around Kampala, while a good number had taken the eight-hour bus journey from Onduparaka a day before.
Nakivubo was buzzing for the two Big League fixtures; the first – a playoff between Proline and Lira’s Sporting United to decide the final team to be promoted to the Uganda Premier League (UPL). Edris Lubega’s brilliant double helped Proline bag that 4-1.
The second game; a tussle between Onduparaka and Jinja SS to decide the 2016 Big League winners, seemed to have been the main crowd puller.
Jinja took that one 2-0, Musa Magumba and Joseph Opolot scoring. If Onduparaka overwhelmed Jinja in the stands, the Easterners simply outthought the former on the turf.
They applied themselves with class, bossing structural play and some magnificent final third touches to leave some wondering why the hullabaloo about Onduparaka.
Yet this was a side that had topped their Big League group, formed bulk of West Nile team that edged Cranes 1-0, spanked SC Villa and Soana on their way to the Uganda Cup semis, and one that has not lost in their 15 home matches at Green Light Stadium. But it is their fans that stand out most, and what was experienced at Nakivubo will surely have teams worried of the trip to Onduparaka next season. “What I saw in Onduparaka, I think I last saw it in Mbale some 15 years,” Soana coach Charles Ayekoh, who lost there in the Uganda Cup quarters, told me.
“When they are playing they paint the whole area green and white. They love the team so much, everyone is involved. What I witnessed is real passion. And they really play well. I’m happy for them.”
As former Maroons coach Asaph Mwebaze alluded, the lesson for other clubs with upcountry connections is to relocate their teams to those areas so as to have a genuine fan base, the true lifeblood of any team.
