The Uganda Hockey National team which is set to participate in the Olympic Qualifiers in South Africa was flagged off on Wednesday 25th October.

The team consists of 18 players and only one player who wasn’t part of them during the Africa Cup of Nations in Ghana, has been added.

Uganda is in pool A with the hosts, South Africa, Nigeria and Zimbabwe.

They will be playing their opening game on Sunday 29th October against Nigeria whom they lost to in AFCON last year.

Coach Innocent Raskara who was recently appointed will be hoping to get off to a good start in the tournament and the optimism is high in the camp.

Emmanuel Baguma has been trusted to lead the team as Captain and he told us about the pressure of such a mantle.

“The pressure keeps growing because we’ve not had much opportunity to play these championships”. About the performance he added, “since we didn’t do well at the last tournament, we feel there’s need to improve our game and be better”.

Kenneth Tamale who is part of the Coaching staff also shared a few insights about the team. “We have had time to prepare, and we maintained our team from last year’s AFCON” he said about the team’s preparedness.

About expectations, he was full of confidence. “We are going to be the first team to qualify for Olympics, why? because we are ready, we know the teams we are going to face, we know our weakness and we are going to work on it”

Traveling team

Kavuma Stuart
Batusa Collins
Baguma Emmanuel (CPT)
Agaba Alfred
Bayuule Brian
Opio Thomas
Mpiima Jordan Michael
Ssemwogerere Richard
Akanyihayo Matthias
Ochan Bosco
Kaijuka Richard
Okello Martin
Mugisa Maxwell
Walusansa Peter
Ntumba Timothy
Mutalya Solomon
Ashraf Tumwesigye
Brian Okodi

Officials

Innocent Raskara (Head Coach)
Kenneth Tamale (Asst Coach)
Solomon Ogwal (Physio)
George Ntegeka (FIH Tech)
Stanely Tamale ( FIH Umpire)
Emmanuel Ewochu (Team Doctor)

Uganda is yet to have a team sport participating at the Olympics, both the Men and Women Rugby Sevens teams came close this year, but were unable to qualify direct. They however still have another shot in the Repechage tournament that will be happening in June 2024.