The Federation of Uganda Football Associations on Friday February 16 unveiled their own SportsWear Manufacturer, Janzi and at the same event, launched a match ball.
The match ball dubbed Zakayo, in reference to the legendary Chimpanzee will be the official match ball for all Fufa competitions.
At a function held at Fufa House, Mengo, the FUFA President explained the idea behind Janzi.
“As FUFA, we are always innovative and today we unveil to you, Janzi, the official Sportswear Manufacturer of all FUFA sports gear and assortments,” he started.
“Janzi is a registered trademark that will help FUFA to avoid middlemen. We all know that several kit manufacturers don’t own factories but only package and sell to us. We believe having our own brand will help us to get these items at a cheaper price.”
Janzi is also the company behind the production of Zakayo but also does produce jerseys, travel bags, tracksuits, caps, hats, branded cups, umbrellas etc.
FUFA CEO Edgar Watson revealed the reason behind naming the match ball Zakayo before asserting the quality of the ball is up to the required standard.
“The FUFA Match ball was made with consideration of our heritage as Ugandans. The official name of the ball is Zakayo, a legendary chimpanzee whose story dates back to 1963 in Semliki l National Park but later transferred to Entebbe Zoo where he lived until he died in 2018.
“The ball has been made with consideration of the latest trends in terms of texture, design, durability and flight.”
Zakayo has patches of the three colours of the Uganda flag. Black, yellow and red stand for Ethnicity, Abundant sunshine and Brotherhood.
The texture on the ball’s outer skin is designed to offer consistent flight, rate of spin and speed.
According to Fufa, there have been extensive experiments with the ball on different grounds, including bare pitches and the texture is suitable to last long enough.
Watson also revealed that 𝗭𝗮𝗸𝗮𝘆𝗼 will cost Ushs 50,000 and Ushs 100,000 because it has been produced in two categories.
The FA however gave out balls to members with every StarTimes Uganda Premier League club receiving 25 balls (20 for the Senior Team and 5 for the Junior Team).
BetPawa Big League clubs received 15 Balls while FUFA Women Super League have also received 15 balls.
The event was graced by the various members from the football community that included club chairpersons, Fufa executive members, current and former players and the media among others.
This is good news. However, we should be careful.
Remember the Jabulanyi ball that caused problems at the World Cup? Many players struggled with it, especially English premier league players because they were used to a different ball.
The Germans were not affected because they used the FIFA ball in the Bundesliga.
These details matter!
Let’s not handicap our players at the international level. At the very least, let the national teams train with international balls.