Villa will be returning to pre-season training on June 28.
The purpose of this early return, considering that the 2025/26 Uganda Premier League (UPL) season does not kick off until mid-September, is to ensure that the team gets ample preparation, in order to have a good platform upon which to build a title-winning challenge for next season, according to coach Morley Byekwaso.
By that time, Villa will most likely be smarting from the departure of midfielder Ronald Ssekiganda and attacker Jonah Kakande. The duo were instrumental in the Jogoos’ seventeenth title-winning campaign in 2023/24.
From a simple count, they bring Villa’s key departures from the title winning season to seven. For many Villa fans, the aforementioned was unheard of, when the team dominated Ugandan football from the 1980s to the early 2000s.
Villa acquired the best players and kept them for long hence beating all and sundry, including being a force on the continent. Villa reached two successive continental finals in 1991 and 1992.
However, while the club’s fans look back on those times with nostalgia, the fact is that the Villa of then is not the one today. The club’s football strategy has since changed and, therefore, expectations must be managed.
“Right now, our focus is on building a team of young players who can stay with us for a longer period than the many that have left us,” Byekwaso said.
He hastily added that the club’s focus, which he totally agrees with, is to go into schools to pick emerging stars, that the club can keep for at least five or so years. The recent turnover of players at the club has been hinged on the fact that some of the players like Kenneth Ssemakula, Charles Bbale, Umar Lutalo and Fred Gift, who were at the club between 2021 and 2024, joined the club on the recommendation of their representatives.
As such, they signed short-term contracts, most of which did not go beyond three years. So, by the time their contracts were running out, other suitors were on their tails. So, unless Villa were ready to pay some hefty sums, the players had to leave.
Byekwaso said: “As a team, we have a payment structure we cannot go beyond. So, if the player does not accept the club’s terms, sadly, he is free to leave.” I
n the past, the Villa supremo, Omar Mandela, the proprietor of Cafe Javas, City Oil and Supreme Flour, bought top players expensively. The likes of Phillip Obwin from arch-rivals Express FC was a protracted battle.
Others, like the ones involving Byekwaso, Saidi Abed and Tom Muwonge from KCCA FC in 2001 evoke unconfined memories for Villa loyalists. Morris Sunguti, Joseph Mutyaba and James Odoch from Express felt like World War Three would erupt, all because of how provocative it felt.
It stirred hate for Villa, but also stocked the fires of football rivalry. That is just a few of many others. But it was largely about flexing muscle and showing who ruled in these parts. A similar blueprint was followed by Ben Misagga, when he was Villa president between 2014 and 2018.
Like Mandela, Misagga ‘stole’ players from bitter rivals such as KCCA, even after they had agreed terms. A case in point was Vitalis Tabu and Abel Eturude. But that is all water under the bridge now as far as the Jogoos are concerned.
While Byekwaso promised that next season they will be competing for title number 18, he put a disclaimer: “We must have a good pre-season if we are to win the league next season”, the script that Villa is following appears to suggest mid-table mentality.
For example, Byekwaso noted that right now, they are inducting a number of young boys in the set-up on long-term contracts. Some of those include Hamidu Nsubuga, Mungolia Baraza and Cyrus Bajja, whom he expects to settle in quickly enough with the help of the seniors like David Owori, Charles Lwanga and goalkeeper Meddie Kibirige, who will be in his sixth season at the club.
Speaking of Kibirige, the coach confirmed that he is his number one, owing to his experience. But that is not a view that will be rapturously received by most Villa fans. Goalkeeping has been a major problem for the club since Robert Odongkara and Yasin Mugabi left the club back in 2009.
In response, Byekwaso said: “I understand that our goalkeepers have been quite inconsistent. But we must back them so that they build confidence to become more reliable.”
In addition to that, Byekwaso acknowledged that the performance last season was not good for a team of Villa’s standards. In fact, it is even more disconcerting for a host of fans, who are becoming apathetic towards the club, following the lowly standards they have embraced today.
Perhaps, in another life, there is no way Byekwaso would have seen out the season, after the team finished sixth. In 2023/24, Villa had the fourth best defence, conceding 21 goals in 29 games. This season, they have conceded 30 goals, and were ranked seventh in terms of defending.
Byekwaso agrees that last time round was not good enough. He added, that although the attack scored four more goals (44) than in the championship winning season, they missed so many chances. Now, one wonders whether the departure of attacker Kakande is not actually going to affect Villa’s attack significantly.
In the 2023/24 season, he scored nine goals, and followed that up with eight in the recently concluded one. He had four assists in each of the last two seasons.
According to Byekwaso, players such as Kakande are rare talents, and he believes he was the best in one-on-one situations, beating defenders easily. But whatever the case, Villa will move on because it is bigger than anyone of its stars!
