Six times straight NBL Champions – the longest streak known in Ugandan basketball and along the way some adversity, doubts from critics, yet tonight seems like the start of the greatest hurdle for Oilers at this stage in the quest to retain the NBL title. Oilers were tipped to be in great form for the NBL playoffs ahead of their Basketball Africa League qualifiers in Dar-es-Salaam in October but then struck some stroke of bad luck – Injuries. The Oilers are faced with the injuries of Francis Azolibe and Jonathan Egau who will certainly not be available for the rest of the season. Stephen Omony has been on time restriction for most of the season and even then had his injury aggravated. His participation in the playoffs is a huge doubt – this coupled with the unavailability of Jimmy Enabu who’s enrolled in Flying School is a huge blow to the Oilers.
On the contrary, the Warriors were the unhealthy team before the NBL went into the break but Coach Mutebi considers the break “a blessing in disguise”. It has helped his team recover from the injuries.
“It could be tricky on the point of match fitness but that long break has given us time as a team to recover from injuries. Before the break, we had just about three healthy players, now we can count up to eight. I feel it was a blessing in disguise (the break).” – Ronnie Mutebi, Head Coach Warriors told Basketball256’s Cucu Brian.
Warriors boast of a formidable front court that has Said Amisi (Carmelo) and Stanley Mugerwa (with the back up of Samad Imran and Aaron Ojoo) who will certainly be matched up against Laundry Ndikumana and James Okello. With Francis Azolibe out, a lot is going to be tasked of Laundry and Okello.
The back court match ups include Chris Omanye , Mark Opio , Daniel Gaaki, Micheal Otieno, Gatwek Kutai and Mike Bazangu going against the Oilers backcourt of Josh Johnson, Tony Drileba, Ivan Muhwezi, Ben Komakech, Omongin Abel, and Jjuko ‘Najja’ Daniel.
“I will go deep into the bench and also try to make use of our size advantage.” – Ronnie Mutebi
Coach Mutebi acknowledges that the Oilers have in the past had an edge over his team because of experience and composure in tough situations and his team will not be taking anything for granted.
“They’re the defending champions. From the on set, we’ve set our eyes on the Championship and we have always known that to win it, we have to beat them. This is the moment.” – Ronnie Mutebi
The Oilers circumstantially backed against the wall with injuries, have to look to the young stars they’ve been breeding in Tony Drileba and Ivan Muhwezi to shine some light while hoping on the likes of Ben Komakech to pull something out of their bag.
KCCA Leopards vs UCU Lady Canons | 6:30 PM | Lugogo Arena
City Oilers vs Warriors | 8:30 PM | Lugogo Arena.
brian@basketball256.net | Twitter: @Cucubrian
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