Make home tilt count

Uganda’s female football team Crested Cranes start their third continental qualifiers in five years today.
The first was the 2018 Africa Women’s Cup of Nations (AWCON) qualifiers in which Kenya beat Uganda 1-0 on aggregate in the first round owing to an imposing display in Machakos.

The second was the 2020 Caf Olympic qualifiers in 2019 where Ethiopia capitalized on home support to win 3-2 in Bahir Dar before the home pressure got to Uganda who also lost 1-0 in Lugogo. Ethiopia progressed from that first round 4-2 on aggregate.
Today’s meeting between Crested Cranes and Ethiopia’s Lucy in the first and penultimate qualifiers of AWCON 2022 offers an opportunity for revenge.

For the first time in a qualification campaign, Crested Cranes start at home but these are new times too. The guidelines in force to curb the Covid-19 pandemic dictate that no fans can be in the stadium so a bit of home advantage is deflated. Uganda has, however, also since changed ‘home’ from Lugogo to St. Mary’s Stadium - Kitende where they can start to piece together positive fortunes.
The pressure is still on to play the perfect match before the second leg of this first round qualifier next week in Bahir Dar.

The highly rated forwards led by national team top scorer Hasifah Nassuna and Iceland-based Sandra Nabweteme must get firing in decisive encounters like these. But so must Fazila Ikwaput, the only one with Uefa Champions League experience, and the budding Juliet Nalukenge who has recently secured a move to Cyprus and joined the senior team from the U-20 team that beat Kenya 10-3 on aggregate in a World Cup qualifiers almost a fortnight ago.
At the recently concluded Cosafa Women Championships, which Uganda used as a precursor for the qualifiers, the Crested Cranes scored five goals - albeit in just one match against Eswatini.

The taps ran dry against more ambitious opponents like Namibia and Zambia as they stopped at the group stages.
Coach George Lutalo left satisfied with the performances in which Uganda relatively dominated proceedings in his first three games as Crested Cranes coach. He will look to go toe-to-toe with Ethiopia, an approach he feels will get the best out of forwards like Nabweteme, Nassuna and Nalukenge.
“We have worked hard to improve on our scoring form and we are a much better team with the reinforcement from the U-20s,” Lutalo said in the post match press conference, yesterday.

Familiar foe Abera
Lucy offer another challenge as they like to dominate possession too and have a potent forward in Loza Abera, who has scored against Uganda in all three meetings since 2016.
In fact Uganda’s only wins against Ethiopia - in the Cecafa Championship of 2018 and 2019 - came without Abera involved. 
This time Abera could link up with her Central Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) teammate Medina Busser, with whom they tortured defences in the Caf Women’s Champions League qualifiers in Nairobi last month - scoring a combined 19 goals in five matches.

If Ethiopia get their way, it is going to be a long afternoon for Uganda’s defence marshalled by Shadia Nankya plus captain and goalkeeper Ruth Aturo. 
But it will also offer Uganda an opportunity to utilize the counter-attacking prowess of forwards like Ikwaput and Resty Nanziri.
“Our team has not changed much from the ones that beat Ethiopia in Cecafa so we are pretty confident of doing the job.

We have worked for close to two months with the coach and we are all pulling in the same direction. We believe that togetherness will get us over the line,” Aturo said. The winner of the Uganda/Ethiopia tie will face either Kenya or South Sudan in the second round.  The 2022 AWCON is slated for Morocco from July 2-23 and will have 12 teams taking part.