Cranes Thump Guinea

Fred Kaweesi

4 June 2011

David Obua and Musa Mudde celebrate after Geoffrey Massa scores the Cranes’ second goal in the 2-0 victory over Guinea Bissau at Namboole

UGANDA Cranes strolled to the brink of qualifying for the 2012 Nations Cup finals after a majestic 2-0 win over Guinea Bissau yesterday.

Cranes left-back Godfrey Walusimbi sent the 60,000 capacity crowd at Namboole Stadium into raptures of joy with a contender for goal of this qualifying edition in the 38th minute before Geoffrey Massa sealed glory with yet another beauty on 58 minutes.

The result strengthened Uganda’s qualifying prospects on 10 points, six ahead of second-placed Kenya, who battle Angola in the other group game in Luanda today.

Williamson answered

In the run up to this game, Coach Bobby Williamson had warned his charges against complacency against a team, whose abilities on the ball were there for all to see in Bissau.

The Scot had demanded for passion, strong mentality and commitment. He had challenged all the experienced guns in the shape of David Obua, Nestroy Kizito and Andrew Mwesigwa to step to the plate and lead the rest of the youngsters to glory.

Although Obua sadly tainted the merry-making afternoon with a moment of shame, the rest of the side stood to the task and accomplished the assignment against the visitors, who partly contributed to their defeat by some scandalous decisions.

Guinea Bissau drop stars

For unknown reasons, Guinea Bissau opted to drop three of their first team stars Jose Zezinho, Cicero Semedo and Miche Dorusio.

If it was a move that was meant to surprise Cranes, then we can safely say it back-fired.

When the three eventually came on, Cranes had literally sealed victory and a deserved victory at that as their attacking and expansive approach to the game was at times irresistible.

African heavyweights Nigeria, Ghana have all fallen at Mandela Stadium before. And so did Angola, just a few months ago -in a humiliating 3-0 defeat.

What was so different that Bissau expected?

The West Africans, in some sort of shambles after making the trip to Kampala late and almost failing to train the day before, revealed rough edges right from the start.

They conceded five consecutive corners, survived two scares that had Geoffrey Massa fluff a seater, Vincent Kayizzi and Andrew Mwesigwa miscuing a shot and header from a free-kick respectively before succumbing to the first goal.

Walusimbi scores a great goal

Whether Walusimbi attempted to cross to any of the other attacking players is a debate for another day, the fact is it was a goal out of this world.

From 25-yards, Walusimbi -the youngest player on the pitch caught Guinea Bissau’s goalkeeper Jonas Azevedo off his line with a swerving ball to hand Cranes a crucial lead.

On evidence of their first half showing, Guinea Bissau had clearly marched into the fixture short on ambition. The visitors however looked rejuvenated into the second half, and could have bounced back into the game instantly.

Bacar Balde failed to direct his shot into the net after being out-muscled by Mwesigwa.

That seemed to have awoken the Cranes, who then caught the visitors on the break, Tony Mawejje patiently playing Massa into Bissau’s box.

The Egyptian-based striker composed himself, dummied and then rounded Azevedo before rolling home the second.

From this moment, Cranes decided to play safe, keeping possession with a few occasional counter-attacks with second-half substitute Geoffrey Sserunkuuma in search for that elusive third strike.

That said, the game was literally won the moment Onyango saved Emmanuel Jorge’s header on 78 minutes although Semedo could also have set-up a tense finish to the game had he beaten Onyango off Zezinho’s well-weighted free-kick.

Luckily he didn’t -the more reason Cranes kept a clean sheet.

AllAfrica – All the Time