KAMPALA (Uganda) - Kenya-born John Omondi will be at the coaching helm of Uganda ahead of this year's FIBA U16 African Women's Championship (13-23 July) in Tunisia.

Omondi is not short of international experience.

He qualified South Sudanese club Cobra Sports for the 2022 Basketball Africa League. Now he is relishing a first taste of national team competition with Uganda.

The former Cobra coach is in camp preparing the East African nation's U16 for the continental tournament.

Uganda finished fourth at the 2021 U16 Women's African Championship after a 53-51 loss to Algeria in the Third-Place Game

Omondi told FIBA.basketball his appointment was because of his involvement in the game at the grassroots level.

"It's a great privilege to coach this team (Uganda U16). I think they (the national federation) have seen what I do. I am involved in a lot of youth basketball, and maybe that's where the interest came from," said the former Cobra coach.

"When you get this kind of opportunity, you must make the most out of it. I have coached at the high school level, U20 and seniors. Now this being a national team, it's a different ball game. It is the youngest group of players I have coached at international level.

"I have been entrusted with the team. So, I have repay the faith they have put in me," he said.

The former Ndejje University coach and his staff have already identified players for their camp, but Omondi has one challenge in his team. And that is the lack of height.

"I have a vibrant coaching team that helped me reach out to many players. We have had several camps and tryouts for the team. So far, we have 20 players that we are working with, and all of them are promising," said Omondi.

"We have a good pool of guards. What we are lacking is bigs. So we will have to adapt and work with what we have ahead of the competition."

Omondi (second from left) is pictured with his Cobra Sports during the BAL Qualifiers

The East African nation, tournament hosts Tunisia, Algeria, Angola, Chad, Egypt and Mali, gained automatic qualification for the U16 Championships.

Omondi hopes that the Ugandan players will use the tournament to improve their playing skills and grow within the country's system.

"I want them to play good basketball. That is the most important thing. I want them to learn and use it as a platform to get to the next level. The key thing is competitiveness, but they have to learn and play the right way," said Omondi.

"We will push them to try and reach their potential. We have players with good skill sets and energy. We want to get the best out of them."

In terms of their prospects at the tournament, Omondi has huge ambitions for this group of players.

"Every coach wants to reach the final. That is always the target. There are big teams at this tournament, and we will face challenges. We want to go as far as possible. If we make the final four, it will be a big plus. We know what we have and what our weaknesses are. We have to work on them to gain the best advantage," concluded Omondi.

FIBA