For those who graced the historic day two years back when Uganda Cranes broke the 39 years jinx of not making it to the AFCON finals, that day recapped in just almost the same style and atmosphere.
Cranes kicked off the game with just in need of a point to seal their automatic qualification to the 2019 AFCON finals in Cameroon but at the end pick maximum points.
The game kicked off amidst cheers from the crowd and the team pushed hard to draw first blood. Farouk Miya had the best chance in the 15th minute to put Uganda Cranes in front but Cape Verde goalkeeper was up to the task.
After the halftime break, the visitors asked the questions threat but the boys condensed the play and got back into the game with some exciting attacks.
The awaited goal arrived in the 77th minute after Patrick Kaddu went in the air and put Geoffrey Walusimbi’s cross to the back of the net. The boys managed to hold the game until the final whistle to seal the Cranes’ in next year’s AFCON finals.
This is will be the seventh time the Cranes participate in the continent’s most prestigious tournament. Our maiden appearance was in 1962 where only four teams played in the finals and the boys managed to come fourth.
Six years later, we made the second appearance before making three consecutive back to back qualifications in 1974, 1976 and 1978. However, the most notable of those campaigns was the 1978 campaign where the boys went all the way to the final losing to Ghana.
Unfortunately, after such heroic performance, the team experienced a disastrous decline that took us 39 years to overcome as we beat Comoros 1-0 in 2016 at Namboole to break the jinx thanks to Farouk Miya’s first half strike.