Williamson won't be calling Laszlo for advice

TRADEMARK stubbornness is still evident in Bobby Williamson as his second, and possibly final, match in charge of Uganda approaches.

Rather than call his predecessor, the Hearts manager Csaba Laszlo, for advice on Sunday's opponents Benin, he will go it alone and hope for the best.

Irked by reports that Laszlo labelled him "unprofessional" for losing to Niger last month and consequently damaging Uganda's chances of World Cup and African Cup of Nations qualification, Williamson has turned his portly back. That's despite the fact failure to progress will see the former Hibs manager out of a job.

Uganda currently sit level on points with Angola in African qualifying Group 3, with a goal difference poorer by three. An Angolan win over bottom-of-the-section Niger will mean that Uganda must defeat Benin, group leaders by five points, emphatically. As Williamson himself says, "It's a big ask".

A condition of his year-long contract, reported to be worth 93million Ugandan Shillings (around £32,000], is that it can be terminated after two games if Uganda fail to finish in the top two of their first-phase World Cup section, which doubles as African Cup of Nations qualifying.

Williamson, 47, is no stranger to the tap on the shoulder. He suffered it at both Chester City and Plymouth Argyle. At Hibs he once infamously suggested that anyone who desired entertainment should attend the cinema and not football, and he might have considerably more time for the flicks if Sunday's events conspire against him.

Laszlo suffered a 4-1 defeat with Uganda against Benin in Contonou in June – "we had to sleep on the bus the night before the game", was his recollection – and could undoubtedly provide an insight into their strengths. He felt Williamson should have gleaned information from him before the Niger game, which Uganda lost 3-1 despite being ahead at half-time, but the Scot does not feel compelled to make contact.

"I won't be speaking to Laszlo," said Williamson, speaking exclusively to the Evening News from Kampala. "He has his job to do and I've got my job to do. I have assistants here who worked with Laszlo, so I won't be speaking to him because I heard enough about the comments he was supposed to have made about me after the first game.

"Did he speak to Stevie Frail regarding players at Hearts or opposition in the Premier League? I don't think he did, and not many managers do that, if any. I spoke to Laszlo after his comments and he assured me he never said I was unprofessional. He said that FUFA (Federation of Uganda Football Associations] was unprofessional. I can only take his word for that.

"I've got the copies of the DVDs from the first Benin game. I'll watch them and analyse them as I see fit. He (Laszlo] has his own job to do, he left this job so he'll be concentrating on his job and I'm going to concentrate on mine. I wish him all the best."

The brusque response is nothing new, for Williamson prides himself on vehemently defending his corner. FUFA's leaking of intimate details about his contract also prompted an irascible reaction.

"I'm not going to add to the speculation, my contract situation with FUFA is private and confidential. I could be out after the game or I could stay, who knows? That's been the case with all the other contracts I've signed. I believe these things should stay confidential and if people want to add to it, then feel free.

"I signed my contract in private and the details of it shouldn't be in the public domain."

You could be forgiven for assuming he feels under pressure as his African escapade nears the nail-biting stage. According to Williamson, there is little point fretting about whether FUFA will dispense with his services next week.

President Lawrence Mulindwa and his associates incurred Laszlo's wrath with claims of contractual defaults when he joined Hearts, although the lack of subsequent legal action hints that such talk was without foundation.

"I'm certainly not going to be talking about my employers like that," explained Williamson. "I've got a lot of respect for them and I won't be criticising anybody at FUFA, publicly or privately. That goes for football players as well, I've never done it and I'm not going to start now.

"I've never said a bad word about clubs I've left either, whether I liked the directors or not or whether I felt they were efficient or not. It's just not my style.

"Who knows what they (FUFA] are thinking? I don't think about it and I don't worry about it. I'll deal with it if something happens because you can't be afraid of failure. You can lose your job at any given time in football. You have to face it if it happens and it's very possible because you can't win every football match.

"Suffer a heavy defeat and you could be facing the sack. There will always be people speculating about it, I'll just be focused on going out and winning Sunday's game.

"Do you know something? I haven't got a plan for my career. At every club I've been at, I've never planned my career. I've just done my best for the club until somebody asked the question if I want to go somewhere else or they ask me to leave. Then I have a decision to make.

"I want to stay here for a while yet. It doesn't matter if you have a two-year contract or a 20-year contract, if there's a parting of the ways contracts mean very little. I don't know how long I'll be here. I'm not wishing my life away and I don't have a business plan in place to stay here for two years then go somewhere else.

"I know managers who do work that way. They stay for a couple of years then look to go elsewhere. That's never been my forté, I try to keep my eye on the ball and not look too far ahead. If you start doing that you lose sight. I'll just keep on working as hard as I can for FUFA."

Strictly speaking, this isn't Williamson's first flirtation with African football. He brought Nigerian international defender Taribo West to Plymouth and then watched him and others perform so haplessly that they cost him his job. Living and working in Kampala has been another experience altogether, though.

"The facilities are poor, the surfaces are very bad. A lot of club teams play in the national stadiums and many of them train there too, so the surfaces take a pounding. If one thing, it helps the players with their touch. When they do play on better surfaces they can become better for it.

"The weather's great, we don't get a lot of bad days. It's actually good getting up in the morning and putting sun cream on before you go to your work. I can suffer a bit, though, because too much sun on ma heid and it gets burnt quickly."

The return to Glaswegian brogue brings the thought that he could just as easily be standing in his native Easterhouse as an African outpost. Only slight satellite interference in the phone signal gives it away. Williamson returned home to lay his late father to rest earlier this week but his wife and grown-up family remain in Scotland.

"I only arrived back in Uganda on Wednesday," he said. "I got off the plane at twenty to seven in the morning and went straight to training for nine o'clock. There's no set programme for my life here. If I have the chance to go back home and I can afford to go home, I'll do that." Now comes one of the biggest challenges of his managerial career, the attempt to take Uganda to the 2010 African Cup of Nations – ironically being held in Angola.

"That's the reason I'm here, to help Uganda get to that tournament.

"We're one game away from it and it would be a good experience for me. No matter where you manage you want to be successful, do well for yourself, your employers, the players and the fans. Ugandan football is still developing and I'm hoping to stay here and help it develop further.

"We played well in my first game, it was just a poor pitch and a lot of other factors that contributed to the defeat. It was really, really hot in Niger which didn't help. But we had plenty of chances to win the game and never took them. That came back to bite us as the old adage goes.

"If our players play as well as they can do against Benin, we'll get the result we're looking for. But it's outwith our hands. It's up to Angola to go and win their game, which will probably put it beyond us. We would need to score plenty because Angola are already two goals better off than us just now. Benin are top of the section so it's a difficult task against them."

Williamson's future is likely to rest on the outcome. If FUFA shunt him on to a plane back to Europe, the refusal to call Laszlo will have been costly. For this former Hibs manager, help from Hearts might be advisable before it's too late.