Tag Archives: Ugandan Football

Institutional football clubs need sight of professional football

In February 2019, an image of the 1995 Uganda league table was shared on social media. In this image, the league had 15 teams, 11 of the 15 clubs were institutional teams.

The Podcast
An image of the 1995 top flight league table in Uganda showing the number of institutional owned clubs.
An image of the 1995 top flight league table in Uganda showing the number of institutional owned clubs.

Back then, institutions injected funds into football because they had the capacity to pay salaries and handle other costs that come with playing the league.

These institutions must have relied on tax payer’s money, something you can’t rely on upon forever to fund football.

Fast forward to 2019, only KCCA FC among the 11 institutional clubs that played in the 1995 league is still active.

Considering that Uganda’s budget was generally funded by donors and some taxes (I stand to be corrected) they were sane enough to ensure that money allocated from the budget doesn’t end up as recurring expenses in football.

The other 10 clubs have since closed shop because they didn’t have funds to operate a football club in the league.

The 2018-19 UPL season had seven institutional clubs. Uganda Revenue Authority (URA), Police, Maroons, Ndejje University, Kirinya Jinja SS, Bidco (BUL) and Kampala City Council Authority (KCCA) in addition to those clubs in the top flight, Plascon, Army (UPDF) and Water FC are other institution teams in the second-tier league.

It’s shocking that 10 institutions exited football years ago but a separate group of institutional clubs are still active in football. Have they researched why the other institutions exited?

Institutions had the funds to operate football clubs because government expenditure wasn’t monitored and football was amateur. Let me stick to the amateur football explanation for the rest of the article.

Amateur football doesn’t care how much revenue you make, all you need is to show up and play. The organization is basic too, all you need is a committee of volunteers earning allowances to do whatever has to be done.

WHAT HAS CHANGED?

Football is now professional, not fully in Uganda but at least it’s starting to paint the picture of being professional.

Professionalism comes with its demands. You have to EMPLOY the RIGHT people; you need a corporate governance module to ensure self-sustainability and the other basics that come with being professional.

In football, the challenges of being professional are much more demanding because a club is expected to spend according to how much money it makes from football-related activities.

KCCA FC has done very well to start its journey to self-sustainability, they have employed the right people and managed to attract sponsorship that funds almost 60% of the club’s budget.

WHAT ABOUT THE OTHER INSTITUTIONAL CLUBS?

As football in Uganda continues on the journey to professionalism, the other institutional clubs will drop out of football because they have struggled to do the basics of football management.

Starting with employing the right people that work full time to make the club professional.

On matchday 30 of the 2018-19 Uganda Premier League (UPL) season, KCCA FC hosted Maroons FC on coronation day (trophy ceremony), KCCA FC had to give Maroons FC playing shorts to use (let that sink in).

Maroons will give you reasons for borrowing a playing kit from KCCA FC but no sane mind would entertain that excuse.

There are plenty of examples in which institution clubs have struggled to show the kind of organization expected out of them. When Police FC hosted Paidha Black Angels (PBA) at Lugogo, the match was stopped at a certain point after a PBA fan threw objects at the assistant referee, officially the stop was recorded as a water break while the offender was dealt with swiftly. Is that security lacking at a Police match or a case of the offender being daring?

URA FC is working on employees wearing jerseys as a sign to support the club but by the time a person joins URA as an employee at an average age of 25, good luck turning them into supporters.

Police FC had merchandise to sell for the 2018-19 UPL season, on inquiry, a customer needed to move to Naguru to buy a Police FC branded cup/flask.

Was it possible to have those cups available in every police post to make it easier for buyers? I am not a marketing expert but neither am I moving to Naguru for a flask I can easily get next door.

In the 2017-18 UPL season, Stanbic Bank donated (lack of a better word) money to support Maroons then for the 2018-19 season, Centenary bank donated money to support Police FC.

Those two banks don’t appear on playing kits. Have those two clubs attempted to find out why a corporate company is willing to give them money but not appear on their jerseys?

SOLUTIONS FOR INSTITUTIONAL CLUBS

KCCA FC is able to attract sponsorship revenue because they have a combination of pedigree, fan base and organized at the moment. Apart from the name, they have tried to be independent of their mother body.

URA, Police, Ndejje University, Kirinya Jinja SS and the rest can attract sponsorship revenue by changing football team names.

Let’s use an example of URA FC since they already have land in Naggalama (I had better be right on that).

If URA FC renamed to Mapenzi FC, URA would be the owners of Mapenzi FC operating as an independent company, the club would initially benefit from being funded by owners to set up a stadium in Naggalama.

The residents would identify with the club and start supporting it, more supporters would increase revenue from matchday, commercial activities like selling club merchandise and TV rights which would attract sponsors.

How long would it take for Mapenzi FC to break even?

Why shouldn’t URA FC use Naggalama FC as a name? Using Naggalama FC would have restricted URA to one area yet URA has a nationwide presence.

When URA stops funding Mapenzi FC, the funds can be used to set up grassroots structures across the country.

Imagine having a Mapenzi FC grassroots structure in every region of Uganda. Mapenzi would have achieved in having first sight on talent that can go on to play for the club and generate money when transferred secondly, Mapenzi FC would have extended its footprint across the country to attract supporters (more revenue) when they are still young (then it will be possible to make an employee proudly wear a Mapenzi FC jersey).

DO INSTITUTIONAL CLUBS HAVE ROLE MODELS?

My example of what URA FC and other institutional clubs need to do by changing names might be coming from an amateur that lacks an informed opinion.

I suggest they benchmark CSKA Moscow in Russia because it’s owned by the army.

I am sure Police, UPDF, URA, Maroons and the rest can easily afford a trip to Moscow.

Disclaimer: The writer doesn’t have anything against institutional football clubs, all examples were used in good faith.

Standards for developing Ugandan football.

In March 2019 Bank of Africa (BOA) published a job advert for sales positions.

One of the MUST have requirements for applicants, was having scored a minimum of a credit 3 in English and Mathematics in Uganda Certificate of Education (UCE).

On 30th April 2019, Bank of Uganda (BOU) published a job advert, MUST have for the BOU job advert was a first-class degree or second upper degree.

In those two examples, the two banks SET A MINIMUM STANDARD for applicants, whether someone with lower grades can do a better job or not, that’s an entirely different debate.

When Bolton Wanderers gained promotion to the English Premier League (EPL) for the 2001-02 season, they were outright relegation candidates.

By the end of the season, Bolton had survived relegation. Sam Allardyce who coached Bolton at that time had researched about opposition teams in EPL.

In his assessment, playing against opponents like Manchester United and Arsenal (the title contenders in that era) takes them less than 11 seconds to get in front of your goalkeeper when they (Man Utd and Arsenal) are defending a corner kick.

He made sure that during the preseason, players were fit enough to handle the demands of being able to sprint the entire length of a pitch in less than 11 seconds.

The demands to play in EPL are much more than just sprinting but in that case, a STANDARD had been set to compete in EPL.

Tottenham Hotspurs has recently built a new stadium to replace White Hart Lane.

One of the reasons for moving was to meet UEFA and EPL standards for having a pitch (playing surface) that measures the 105m length and 68m in width, of course, they had more reasons higher in priority for redeveloping the stadium but whichever reason, it still comes down to the need to meet set STANDARDS.

FC Barcelona has plans to redevelop Camp Nuo because, in its current state, Camp Nuo can’t match the STANDARDS set by Barcelona’s rivals in terms of matchday revenue and experience.

In the football-related examples from Bolton Wanders, Tottenham and Barcelona, the clear observation is the need to meet set standards led to development.

WHAT ARE THE STANDARDS IN UGANDAN FOOTBALL?

At the start of the 2018-19 Uganda Premier League (UPL) season, clubs were required to have green pitches, it’s common sense to have a green pitch (standard) for a football match because it helps to have good football, reduces injuries and makes it easier to officiate among many other reasons.

Paidha Black Angels (PBA) a club based in Zombo, West Nile couldn’t have their pitch ready. They decided to play home matches 90 kilo meters away in Arua.

The cost of transporting, feeding and accommodating players and club officials from Zombo to Arua can match the cost of making a football pitch green (at least for Ugandan football standards).

PBA was allowed to play in the league sharing a stadium with Onduparaka, by the time they returned to play (not yet a green pitch) in Zombo for the start of UPL second round, PBA was facing relegation and the pitch in Arua wasn’t green anymore.

In this scenario, a standard was set but wasn’t enforced which led to reduced standards.

PBA was allowed to play without a pitch then Onduparaka used a bad pitch for the entire second round of the 2018-19 UPL season.

How will pitches develop yet no team is pushed to meet set standards?

Worse case is that accommodating PBA in the league, led to reduced standards.

What was supposed (imagining that other teams had green pitches) to be one bad pitch, created two bad pitches.

Hitting two birds (knocking out standards) with one stone.

Developing has take it or leave it conditions. If you don’t have the requirements for applying at BOU and BOA, don’t bother applying.

If Tottenham and FC Barcelona don’t redevelop their respective stadiums, then match day revenue will not increase (develop).

Ugandan Football’s challenge is that standards have been set but can’t be enforced because of the leniency to accommodate everyone. In the PBA case, a team that couldn’t meet UPL standards got welcomed with a hug.

WHAT’S THE EFFECT?

What message do BOU and BOA send out to the general public when they stick to their recruitment standards? A U.C.E candidate in 2019 will know what’s at stake should they ever wish to work at BOA and BOU in the future.

A team intending to compete in EPL will know what it takes to survive in EPL. Tottenham and FC Barcelona were able to accept their current situation then do something about it, this has led to more teams having new stadiums in Europe.

The need to meet standards helps to push development. If PBA had been kicked out of UPL for not having a green pitch, what message would be sent out to teams gaining promotion?

If PBA had worked on making the pitch green ahead of the second round. How many green pitches would be in the second tier league next season?

How easy would it be to enforce the use of green pitches in the second tier league when three relegated teams are dropping to that league with green pitches?

I don’t know about FUFA and UPL having the guts to stick to set standards but I am sure that as long as FUFA and UPL keep being lenient on who meets set standards, developing football in Uganda will continue being a myth.

In this article, I only used an example of failing to be strict with STANDARDS set for a playing pitch in UPL. That is about 1% of Ugandan football.

Disclaimer: The writer doesn’t have anything against PBA. The example was used in good faith.

Bio banding would help Ugandan footballers.

Bio banding is grouping young players of the same maturation and growth attributes rather than grouping them according to chronological age like using U15, U17.

On average, children start puberty aged 12. During puberty, they go through a growth spurt stage but all this happens at different times for each individual depending on factors that range from quality of nutrition, gender, genes, physical activities e.t.c it’s possible to find two 14-year-olds with very contrasting maturation and growth attributes like height.

POPULARISING BIO BANDING IN FOOTBALL
Bio banding is thought to have been popularized by the Southampton FC academy in England.

Oxlade-Chamberlain was part of Southampton’s U14’s and was struggling to keep up with his peers on the field because his slow growth rate made it easy for him to easily get knocked off the ball.

The club thought of releasing him but James Bunce the head of athletic performance decided to keep him at the club.

James Bunce’s observation was that Oxlade-Chamberlain was very good at using the ball but playing with peers that were bigger, stronger and faster became harder for him which resulted in lower confidence and poor performance.

The Ox as he is known was kept in the U-14’s instead of promoting him to the U16’s to continue his football development in an environment that was suitable for him growth-wise.

By the age of 16, he had gone through his own growth spurt and developed into perhaps the best player of his age category in the whole of England.

The Ox made his senior debut for Southampton at the aged 16 and 199 days. Arsenal paid Southampton 15 million pounds for the then 17-year-old Oxlade-Chamberlain in 2011 then later got paid more when he joined Liverpool for 35 million pounds.

Bar injury, he is one of England’s most influential players at the moment.

BACK TO UGANDA

When the Federation of Uganda Football Associations (FUFA) introduced the FUFA Juniors’ League (FJL) in the 2015-16 season.

It meant that young players were going to get competitive football to help them develop.

In the 2017-18 FJL (U18) season, I was coaching Maroons Junior Team when we decided to register Tony Opio.

He was making 16 years of age in October 2017 but was very small for his age with very good football potential.

During the season, we restricted him to playing 45 minutes per match so that he could enjoy the experience of playing in the league.

I was able to explain to him why I needed to protect him from playing a full match against opponents that were bigger than him because the frustration of not playing well would affect him negatively.

2018-19 FJL season was upgraded to U-19 although I wasn’t his coach anymore I kept following Tony.

He was still the same size and played some matches.

Tony will be making 18 years of age in October 2019 but FJL will return to U-17 for the 2019-20 season which means that Tony will be ineligible to play.

“For a player of his size, FUFA’s competitions committee should consider him playing with the U-17’s because he would fit in. It would help him to have more time on the pitch to develop his talent.”

I know FJL has age cheating challenges but in this case, Tony is already registered and known, Maroons JT also has a very good record of not having age cheats (at least when I coached them).

For a player that was almost considered for selection when the U-17 national team was assembling to start preparations for AFCON U-17 qualifiers, he deserves a bio banding experience to help him develop his talent.

Tony is one in a million of Ugandan players that are struggling with the slow growth rate.

If he’s already been registered in a previous season and there’s a reason to believe he can improve by playing with players of his current physical attributes, then perhaps bio banding would save some of the lost talents in Ugandan football.

Disclaimer: The writer has no disclaimers at the moment.

The technical director in Ugandan football.

The term technical director gets thrown around quite often in Ugandan football.

It’s usually a veteran coach, moving with the senior team of a club and in most cases gets involved in training sessions something I have always thought makes it one of the most misused job titles in Ugandan football.

Every football club has its own way of twisting the term technical director. Sporting director, director of football, head of football relations, director of football development e.t.c, are some of the different titles used.

WHAT’S THE ROLE OF A TECHNICAL DIRECTOR?

This’ a person in charge of defining technical development programs to prepare a club for football in the future.

He/She prepares a long term vision and develops a technical strategy that will improve the level of football in a club after a defined period (in football it has to be a number of years) however, this seemed to be done in the past.

Football in the modern era has three areas of technical, administration and business that need to be developed so that a club gets ready for football in the future and to be sustainable.

To avoid the technical director from being overworked with administrative and business areas of football, some clubs will employ a head of strategy and planning to help the technical director.

From the above break down, we can tell that a technical director’s role has more than a result that happens on the next match day.

We can also tell that it’s a job that requires planning for the future.


SITUATIONAL ANALYSIS, where is the club now?

A technical director should be able to analyze the football environment of the club.

This process requires extensive research and should be answered with honesty (oooohhh Uganda) even if it means having bitter facts without the need to impress superiors.

It’s important for the technical director to avoid the mistake of assuming he/she knows it all while conducting a situational analysis because information missed out at this stage will lead to mistakes.

Clubs in the Uganda Premier League (UPL) had a U-19 team playing in the FUFA Juniors’ League (FJL).

What’s the link between the U19 team and the senior team?

Are the players ready to compete in UPL?

A technical director answering those two questions might find the need to set up a B team that plays in the lowest competitive league to enable U-19 players to continue their development.

STRATEGY, where does the club want to be?

A strategy is a process of determining goals and developing plans to achieve them.

A technical director should be able to develop a long term (minimum of 4 years) strategy based on what was discovered during the situational analysis stage.

A GENUINE U-19 footballer in Uganda isn’t ready to compete in UPL for the 2019-20 season but the club would like to change that situation.

A technical director would then strategize how to set up grassroots (U-12), U-15, U-17, U-20 then U-23 to serve as the B team so that players can have a clear development pathway for the players to be ready in future.

IMPLEMENTATION, how does the club get there?

This’ the most difficult and long-lasting stage for a technical director and the club because it has a lot of changes and challenges that can hardly be foreseen with accuracy.

Basing on the example of setting up grassroots football at the club would be met with the following challenges; Grassroots football has to be broken down into different age categories because children aged 6-12 have different physical and mental features that affect how they learn.

The technical director would then come up with gender-mixed categories of U-8, U-10, and U-12.

They need to be trained three times a week by highly qualified coaches that have pedagogy abilities for handling children.

The recommended ratio of coaches: players is 1:5.

In that paragraph, you can already see the problems faced by a club in Uganda.

One of them is that during school time, it’s almost impossible to have players available, however, this requires a technical director with very good problem-solving skills, enthusiasm, and a positive attitude to avoid blaming or being comfortable with excuses (oooohhh Uganda).

MONITORING AND EVALUATION, Is the club getting there?

In this phase, a technical director ensures the progress of the club is known and measured against the set goals at all times.

Monitoring ensures the quality levels of activities organized respects the defined standard and that relevant feedback is received.

This helps to plan for the next cycle because feedback will show what went wrong and/or right.

Basing on the example of the club setting up grassroots football.

A technical director will set up a football learning syllabus for U-12 players so that at each stage (U-8, U-10, and U-12), players should be able to execute the fundamental skills required to compete in UPL or Women’s Elite League.

Every time the grassroots have a friendly, feedback will be based on the set goals.

It’s important to understand that in grassroots football, the number one aim is for players to have fun and enjoy returning to the training ground so that they can develop a genuine passion for football.

Winning matches or competing should never be used as the goal at that stage (oooohhh Uganda) all players should be treated as individuals.

Those four stages are a tiny fraction of what a technical director does. He/She should have a high level of education, a high level of coaching education and should have played football at any level.

Disclaimer: The writer has nothing against technical directors in Ugandan football.

Developing the Uganda Premier League.

Uganda Premier League (UPL) has been developing with every passing year since Bernard Bainamani took over as C.E.O. Every other season shows improvements.

This particular season 2017-18 has been better in terms of competitiveness. For the first time in a very long time, you find fans debating which team will be relegated and who will be champions. However, it will be a very huge mistake for UPL and its stakeholders to think of this competitiveness as an indicator for a developing league.

UPL’s competitiveness can mainly be attributed to the Federation of Uganda Football Associations’ (FUFA) move to introduce prize money and starting a top 8 tournament that will have prize money too, you can consider that as double prize money.

UPL has lots of challenges like; matches not kicking off on time, match reports not being accurate, fan violence not being checked, inconsistent officiation not being investigated, poor quality playing surfaces, players and coaches not understanding the rules, regulations and laws of the game, lack of ambulances at playing grounds, fixture congestion, league not starting on scheduled time, having unauthorized personnel within the perimeter fence during matches and on the pitch after league matches, league licensing requirements not being followed promptly, to mention but a few.

It’s important to note that although most of these challenges are societal problems that can’t be solved in a very short time, they are some of the minor details that are required to develop a league into a professional brand.

Development has no short cuts, requires ruthlessness too

For UPL to develop at a normal rate, all the stakeholders involved in Ugandan football will have to agree that their capacity is still very low. Stakeholders are; highly qualified coaches of different specialties, sports medicine personnel, match day officials, football administrators, media, players and fans. Having fewer qualified stakeholders running the game of football at the highest level like UPL should call for a reduction in the number of top-flight teams from 16 teams to 10 or 12 teams until we grow the football capacity in terms of quality and quantity of stakeholders.

UPL having twelve teams from sixteen teams would mean having less required but the best of officials, coaches, players, administrators, and media. It would be easier for the fans too but most importantly it would mean more sponsorship money for the fewer clubs to share.

You will never find a developed society that is lenient on certain aspects.

FUFA as the supervisors of league football in Uganda needs to be very ruthless on certain aspects. Club licensing requirements should be much more detailed and have acceptable standards set. Example; what are the playing field measurement dimensions accepted for a pitch to be used in UPL? How does a pitch qualify to be of UPL standards? In this case, I am mentioning pitch but not stadium because a stadium is something that requires a lot of finances that we can’t yet get to but having a quality playing pitch can’t be beyond a UPL club’s current finances.

Every society should have unique ways of solving its own problems. UPL needs creativity

Ugandan football especially UPL is a unique society in its own right, developing will happen when the leaders task the stakeholders involved to document the problems encountered then start coming up with creative ways to solve those problems.

When you mention about UPL having ten or twelve teams, the first response you get is, “those are few clubs in the league, and a professional should play an average of 40 matches in a season”. With our copy and paste syndrome, we forget that a UPL player will be involved in more tournaments like; Clan football, the drum tournament, Uganda Cup, CHAN, underage tournaments for the national team and Super 8 coming up. We forget that we keep exposing them to poor playing surfaces that make it easier for them to get injured.

A 10 team league can creatively have 27 match days, it can also have 34 match days. A twelve team league can have 27 or 32 league matchdays and be very competitive too yet using fewer resources as we work towards growing the capacity of football stakeholders.

The business question to answer would be how UPL teams would be reduced from 16 to 10 or 12 teams which would call for the kind of ruthlessness required to develop. As we head into the 2018-19 season, UPL and FUFA would have to agree on what they would want a UPL club to have, that is to say, set the licensing requirements and standards.

For instance; each club should have a quality playing surface (define what quality is for a UPL playing surface), club operating structures, standard training facilities, set criteria for a number of qualified and specialized coaches and officials, set suspended offense limits e.t.c. FUFA and UPL would then set a timeframe of two seasons and inform clubs that for the 2020-21 season, clubs would have to apply for a license to play in the UPL.

The clubs that will have met the required criteria will play. This should be open to all clubs in the country then watch how clubs out compete themselves to ensure that licensing requirements are met.

For the moment, with our current football capacity, 16 clubs in UPL is a crowd that can’t be efficiently managed to sustain the required rate of football development.