Asks Amavubi to emulate the taxi-men club

FERWAFA president Jean Bosco Kazura has asked Rwanda’s Amavubi Stars to borrow a leaf from Atraco’s recent heroics in the 2009 Cecafa/ Kagame Cup Championship which climaxed on Sunday in Khartoum, Sudan.

The national league champions, who only qualified for the quarter-finals as one of two best finishers at the group stage stunned hosts and tournament favourites El Merreikh 1-0 in a final played in front of a full capacity crowd at El Merreikh’s 42,000 seater red castle stadium.

Hamis Kitagenda was the villain of the day scoring the lone goal in the 15th minute after some clever ball work from his striking partner André Lomami.

It was sweet revenge for Sam Timbe’s troops who had already lost to the latter in the preliminary round of the lucrative CAF Champions League (2-1) on goal aggregates and (1-6) at the group stages.

At one point, Atraco were on the verge of a premature exit at the group stage after back to back defeats in their opening Group B ties against El Merreikh and Mathare United of Kenya (1-2).

However, a convincing 5-0 win over Djibouti’s Kartileh made sure that Atraco progressed to the quarters as one of two best finishers from the four groups.

Kazura’s call comes at a critical time in Amavubi’s 2010 World/ Africa Nations Cup campaign.

After their latest 3-0 defeat against Egypt in Cairo, Rwanda’s best chance of qualification lies in the Africa Nations Cup in Angola but even then, the team needs top notch results from her remaining Group C matches.

Amavubi, rooted at the foot of the group with a point from a possible nine still have two home games against Egypt and Zambia and an away game against group leaders Algeria.

"What Atraco did in this year’s Kagame Cup is living proof that Amavubi still have a genuine chance of qualifying for atleast the Africa Nations Cup,” said Kazura, before adding, " All the team needs is some belief and to trust their instincts.”

"Actually some of them were part of the team that qualified Rwanda to the CAN 2004 and need to bring that experience to the fore in the remaining matches,” he added.

The top team will qualify for next year’s World Cup in South Africa while the top three will earn slots at next year’s Africa Nations Cup in Angola.

Atraco, the third local team to win the competition after Rayon Sport and APR bagged
$50,000 (Rwf28 million) for their performance while losing finalists El Merreikh and TP Mazembe walked away $30,000 (Rwf16 million) and $20,000 (Rwf11million) richer.

It was also Timbe’s third Kagame Club Championship trophy after winning it with SC Villa (2005) and Police FC (2006). He becomes the first man to win three regional club titles with three different clubs.

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