For Johnny McKinstry, the honeymoon is over

Author, Mr Moses Banturaki. PHOTO/FILE.

What you need to know:

  • What then for McKinstry who is already halfway into his three-year contract? The statistics say he has been in charge of 16 games, drawing thrice and losing only once, which is quite impressive, I must say.

I believe that Johnny McKinstry will have started to confirm by now that managing the Uganda Cranes is at once a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing because it’s comparatively a nice and well supported job. No other branch of sport in Uganda generates as much interest or gets as much attention as the Cranes. 
That interest normally translates into preferential budget allocations and sponsorships and the Cranes is easily the best funded and well-run sports outfit in the country by far. 

But also, this very attention can be a curse to the extent that it attracts an unbalanced share of scrutiny. Every self-appointed expert, novice, fan, and their neighbours, has an opinion about the Cranes and its performances. That can have the unfortunate outcome of placing unreasonable demands on a team that is only still learning to fit into the groove of its new manager.

Regardless and typically, I will append myself to the pundits and say when the inevitable examination of what is happening at Chan Cameroon finally arrives, Johnny McKinstry will struggle to come up with answers. Already, on Monday, he led the Cranes versus Rwanda’s Amavubi Stars in what was easily the worst football game I have ever watched. 

It was a kick and run affair in the kind of manner many Ugandans now believe belongs to our footballing past. Also, this approach played right into the hands of the more physically endowed Rwandans. And I am still not sure whether I should blame the overgrown pitch for the chaos or just attribute it to the hectic mood of the night. What is clear to me though is the whole affair stunk of panic and desperation. 

Perhaps more puzzling is that this game came on the heels of an impressive showing in an advance warm-up mini tournament in which we drew with hosts Cameroon, before beating Niger and Zambia. It was with high spirits that we engaged Rwanda an adversary familiar on many levels including being the former employers for Johnny McKinstry. 
In other words, we should have possessed the experience and tactical insight to dispatch Rwanda. Instead, we miserably failed to process a victory out of our domination in possession which was suggestive of the amount of respect they afforded us. 
 
Will this come back to bite us? Most probably. By the time you read this we shall have played Togo (yesterday), with our last group game awaiting us on Monday versus reigning champions Morocco. If we play those two with the technical inexperience we saw versus Rwanda, then it won’t matter that North Africans represents a mental hurdle we are yet to overcome or that West Africans carry serious pedigree into every tournament. We shall be on the first flight out of Yaoundé.

What then for McKinstry who is already halfway into his three-year contract? The statistics say he has been in charge of 16 games, drawing thrice and losing only once, which is quite impressive, I must say. But as he will soon find out when it comes to the Cranes, a manager doesn’t endear himself to the fans and establishment by winning meaningless friendlies or Cecafa, a tournament whose clout is gravely diminished. 

I guess what I am trying to say is that for McKinstry the honeymoon has come to an end and the inspection will be as relentless as it is, unforgiving. Either way it isn’t the kind of environment in which you want to be dropping points in games you should have won. Games like South Sudan in Nairobi last year or Rwanda on Monday this week. 

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Twitter: @MBanturaki