Uganda record league champions, Sports Club Villa will not honour the 2015 Mapinduzi Peace Cup invitation, Kawowo Sports reliably reports.
The 16 time record league winners communicated to Kawowo Sports on Wednesday through their Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Ivan Kakembo that;
We received the invitation on Tuesday and the organizers expected us to travel to Zanzibar by Wednesday, which was very untimely.
Had the communication come early, we would have honored it. We wish them a successful tournament.
SC Villa’s last minute call up was looked to as a timely patch up to fill the void left by Kenya’s Tusker and AFC Leopards, who had both earlier turned down invitations to play in the competition which kicks off on January 1 in Zanzibar.
Uganda’s other representatives at the tournament and defending champions KCC FC arrived in Zanzibar on Wednesday but minus one of their player, defender, Richard Kasagga, who returned to Kampala after his visa to Lebanon (for professional trials) matured.
SC Villa had been placed in group A alongside Tanzania’s Yanga and Zanzibar duo of Polisi and Shaba while KCC FC is in group B together with Tanzania Vodacom Premier League champions Azam and Zanzibar KMKM and Mtende.
The Ugandan league champions open their title defence against Azam on Friday January 2 in what will be a replay of the friendly played a few weeks ago which the Lugogo side won 2-0 in Kampala.
Abdallah Mubiru’s side will then return to action against Mtende on Sunday January 4 and then complete their group fixture against KMKM on Wednesday January 7.
Group C has Tanzania’s Simba and Mtibwa Sugar plus Zanzibar duo of JKU and Mafunzo.
GROUP A GROUP B Group C
KCC FC (Uganda) Mtibwa Sugar (Tanzania)
Yanga (Tanzania) Mtende (Zanzibar) Simba (Tanzania)
Polisi (Zanzibar) Azam (Tanzania) Shaba (Zanzibar)
Shaba (Zanzibar) KMKM (Zanzibar) JKU (Zanzibar)
KCCA Fixture:
January 2, Vs Azam FC
January 4, Mtende
January 7, KMKM
