Uganda’s National Men’s Basketball Team, the Silverbacks returned home after the Afrobasket debut in Tunisia on Tuesday afternoon.
With the exception of Josh Johnson who connected back to the UK, the whole contingent returned and FUBA President, Ambrose Tashobya was contented with the team’s flagship performance.
“Being our first involvement in this kind of tournament our men – the Silverbacks represented us well. They did a good job in Tunisia and competed in every game.” Tashobya said at a brief press conference held at the airport.
“We played five very good games and played some of the top teams and we had great competition. We went into the competition not ranked but we can now officially say we are ranked number 15 on the continent” he added.
The Silverbacks narrowly lost to the Central African Republic – a game that would have lifted the Silverbacks by four places than they finished at the tournament and Tashobya believes they should have pushed harder.
“Coming from no rank to number fifteen is a commendable job although we feel we should have pushed harder and gotten better because we always strive for better”
Tashobya said they garnered enough experience from their debut continental appearance and they hope to build on that experience as the look to qualify the team again.
“It was a good experience for team Uganda, not having been in this kind of challenge to go and compete with the top teams. We want to of course build on this.”
“We hope to build on the experience that we got in this Afrobasket so that we continue building the national team and the years that lie ahead of us are very important”
“Next year is another qualifier for Afrobasket 2017 and we need to keep this team together and work towards qualifying this team again”
