Tony Mawejje, Murushid Juuko and Denis Iguma have less chances of making the final team to face South Sudan, coach Jonathan McKinstry has said.
The trio are some of the local based players that kicked off the training at Lugogo on Monday evening.
Of the 22 players in camp, about five or six players will join the 20 foreign based who were initially summoned as Cranes gears up for South Sudan double header.
The trio returned home to sign for Uganda Premier League teams in the recently concluded window.
“They are the three guys who have huge experiences and have played at huge levels of the game,” McKinstry said about Mawejje, Juuko and Iguma.
“And for different reasons, their last nine or ten months has not been as they liked to have been.
“By signing for UPL teams, they become eligible for CHAN. So, equally, for this week for all of them, I have said to them, if they come and perform, at an extremely high level this week, then of course they will be included for South Sudan.
“However, that’s not the pressure we are putting on them, in my mind given that they have been away for a little bit, the chances of them being named for South Sudan squad is probably less.”
McKinstry says that the trio will be very vital for Cranes in CHAN next year in Cameroon.
He added: “This is reality check for them because we are going to start preparing them for CHAN around December 14, we will get around two weeks in Uganda before we fly to Cameroon for a friendly tourney we will play out there before the CHAN finals.
“If I wait until the December to see them in a training environment, it will probably be too late for them, it will be a big challenge.
The team of locally based players will train for six days at Lugogo.
He added that there he is not putting pressure on his experienced trio but wants to see where they stand physically, technically and how they will fit in the system “because I have said before that not all good players make into the squad, they have to fit into the system we are playing.”
“The type of Uganda Cranes team Mawejje and Iguma played in is different from the one we are building now. This is a great opportunity for them to come and see how we are developing the team and for us to see where they are at.”
He however revealed that their experience will be very important to his young players in the team.
“You should never discount experience. Everyone loves young players to play, there is no doubt about that but experience is so valuable,” he added.
“Huge experience that will help the young boys but it will go down to their performance, no body gets a free ticket for what they have done in the past.”
