In a year when the Cricket Association celebrated 25 years of being an associate nation, everything good and bad that could happen certainly came to the party.
Uganda became an ICC associate nation in 1998 and played at its first ICC event in 2001; the champions trophy in Canada. In that tournament, Kenneth Kamyuka scored 100 off 54 balls batting at number 10 for Uganda and a certain Frank Nsubuga was also part of that team.
In its 25th year of being associated with the ICC and after so many near misses and close shaves Uganda finally qualified for a senior men’s T20 World Cup. Uganda might have been to three junior world cups but the senior men has been an elusive achievement.
Despite the bad vibes around the team before heading to Namibia with head coach Laurence Mahatlane let go in a sort of burning bridges manner, the roots were deep enough to be successful. Three years of learning and unlearning helped Jackson Ogwang and his troops write history for Uganda as the Cricket Cranes will be among the 20 teams at the World Cup in the West Indies and USA from June 3rd to 30th.
The World Cup qualification came on the backdrop of victories in the Continent Cup T20 in Nairobi and the EA T20 Cup in Rwanda plus the Africa Title defence later in the year.
The Victoria Pearls shared in the same glory qualifying for the Global Qualifiers to the Women’s T20 World Cup in Dubai in 2024 after finishing among the top two teams in the Qualifiers in Entebbe.
Uganda was fortunate in the semifinal against Tanzania when they had been on the back foot for most of the game. Zimbabwe the eventual winners of the tournament returned to the globals with Uganda who made their maiden appearance in 2018 in the Netherlands.
The Victoria Pearls also saw success in the Namibia during the Capricorn Series and the Victoria Series at home.
The lows on the pitch included losses to Nigeria and Rwanda for the first time during the Kwibuka and the Cricket Cranes losing to Rwanda during the Africa Cup, also for the first time.
However, the perfect image of the Uganda Cricket Association was tested when a board fallout was played out for the gallery with resignations also tendered in. The association CEO Allan Mugume resigned in the chaos with Chairman Michael Nuwagaba also offering his resignation even though he changed his mind and chose to stay for the remainder of his term.
The U-19 nearly got relegated to the second tier of African cricket after failing to mount a challenge in defence of their title at the Qualifiers in Tanzania. They needed a favour from Tanzania on the final day to defeat Nigeria for them to stay up but finished a distant third behind eventual winners Namibia and runners-up Kenya.
2023 will be forever in the memory of Cricket with 2024 set to be another historic year. A maiden World Cup appearance and a chance for the Victoria Pearls to be at the 2024 Women’s World Cup as well, a gold medal opportunity for both the Cricket Cranes and Victoria Pearls at the All Africa Games, 2024 could just kick start the journey towards the half-century in a big way.
