Trio to miss Zone V Championships

Three national team professional players will not feature in this year’s Fiba Zone V Championships slated for January 21-27 in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania Times Sports has learnt.Those players include; Canada-based Hamza Ruhezamihigo (Concordia), Angola-based Cedric Isome (Primiero do Agosto) and US-based Brannon Darrius (Corr. Victoria).According to head coach Moise Mutokambali, former captain Ruhezamihigo will miss the tournament due to heavy work schedules and Isome will not be available after his new team (Primiero do Agosto) refused to release him because they have other competitions, while Darrius is attending to his wife, who gave birth in mid week.Mutokambali, who replaced the sacked Serb Nenad Amanovic, will be assisted by Espoir coach Jean Bahufite.However, despite missing key players, Mutokambali still expects the available players to do a good job as Rwanda seeks to retain the title they won back in 2011 at home.Dan Rugamba (Seattle Community College) and Bradley Cameron Curtis (Mississippi Gulf Coast College, USA) have joined the camp, while Kenneth Herbert Gasana (Ass Charab Al Hoaciema, Morocco) and Thierry Sukusuku will join next week.The team will also be without Rob Thompson and Mathew Miller, two players, who played key roles when Rwanda won the Zone V qualifier in 2009 and 2011.