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Barcelona Legends to play Uganda Cranes

Uganda will host the FC Barcelona Legends from the 8th to 12th December 2015. The Barcelona team includes top players like Patrick Kluivert, Louis Garcia and Zambrotta, Carles Puyol, Edgar Davids and Ludovic Guily among others. According to the Rayco Garcia, the manager and promoter of RG Sports Solutions, the group will be accompanied by top TV and media houses from Spain and Europe.

Uganda Tourism Board (UTB) will undertake to give a promotional tour of the players to the top tourism spots of Uganda like Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park where they will track mountain gorillas, Murchison Falls National Park and the Source of the Nile. They will also be hosted to dinners and press conferences. The group will play an exhibition match with Uganda all-stars players and also promote and visit junior soccer academies.

The FC Barcelona Legends and the media companies have a fan base of over 200million followers on social media. UTB hopes to capitalize on the publicity to promote Uganda. Not only will the FC Barcelona Legends tour Uganda, but will also take on the national team, the Ugandan Cranes. The game will be played at the Nelson Mandela National Stadium in Namboole on the outskirts of Kampala. The Cranes have only lost twice at Namboole and we will see if they maintain that record. Garcia has faith in Uganda’s soccer talent.

“I have been here and I have seen that Uganda has a lot of soccer talent here. There are many young people with great potential to make it on the world stage. We want to give them this opportunity,” Rayco García said. Kluivert who has been here before was overwhelmed by Uganda’s beauty. “In the short time I have been here, I have no doubt that Uganda is one of the most beautiful countries in the world. We will give you good global coverage for both tourism and investment, because you have a lot to offer,” Kluivert says.

Sports and tourism are synonymous and many sportsmen are already looking at coming to Uganda for tournaments, promote local talent and promote the destination. As part of UTB’s tourism and promotional campaigns, the Board hopes to give the country great visibility and awareness, locally and internationally through initiatives like these ones. Also invited to attend are very important persons all over the world like the President of Congo Brazaville, the Mayor of Canary Islands, Luvuyu Mandela (the grandson of Nelson Mandela), Vice President of Zimbabwe, Vice president of Kenya, Minister of Culture and Sport and Permanent Secretary from Rwanda.

UNICEF in collaboration with RG Sport Solutions will bring 1000 kids from the poorest neighbourhoods in Moroto, Mbarara, Gulu and Arua to get an opportunity to see the players and the game. The Barcelona Legends game comes a week after the visit by Pope Francis (#PopeInUganda). Francis is the third reigning pope to visit Uganda