For Derrick Ddungu, football was never just a game. Long before he became known as Rickman, the musician, radio personality and entertainer, he was a young footballer with dreams of playing for Arsenal and representing Uganda at the World Cup. That dream eventually carried him from the streets of Kampala to Sweden, where he played competitive football for clubs including Gunnilse IS and Sävedalens IF.
Today, after years in music, boxing and broadcasting, Rickman is back in Ugandan football with Express FC. His return is more than a sporting comeback. It is a return to the first dream.
‘I am building a legacy,’ he says.
For Rickman, those words capture a journey that has moved through three demanding worlds – football, music and boxing – without allowing any of them to completely define him.
Football came first
Rickman grew up in a sporting family. His father played football, while his mother played netball and basketball. Growing up in Bakuli, Mengo and Kisenyi, sport was part of everyday life. Football quickly became his obsession.
He played for Kampala Junior Team (KJT) and Friends of Football before his ambitions took him abroad. Sweden became an important chapter in his development.
There, Rickman played for Gunnilse IS and later Sävedalens IF, competing in Sweden’s lower divisions. Contemporary reports from Sävedalen show him playing as an attacking player, creating chances, scoring and providing assists for the club. In one 2018 match, he scored twice for the club’s reserve side, while another report described him as returning from a long injury lay-off to score the winning goal.
For a young Ugandan footballer, Sweden offered more than a chance to play. It was an opportunity to test himself in a different football environment and pursue the career he had imagined as a boy. Rickman was beginning to build a football identity of his own. Then everything changed.
Injury opens another door
In 2016, while playing for Gunnilse IS, Rickman tore his anterior cruciate ligament. The injury required surgery in 2017 and a long period of rehabilitation. He eventually returned to competitive football in 2018 and continued playing for Sävedalens IF, where he was again involved in goals and attacking moves. Swedish club records show him scoring, assisting and returning to action after injury. But the injury had already changed something.
Football, which had once occupied almost all his attention, suddenly had to share space with another passion.
Music.
While recovering, Rickman began taking his songwriting more seriously. He had always written songs and shared them with friends. But he had never imagined that music could become his profession. The injury changed that calculation.
His first single, Naki, introduced him to Ugandan music audiences. Then came Bango in 2019. That was the breakthrough. The footballer who had spent years trying to establish himself abroad was suddenly becoming known for something completely different.
Music opened a new world for Rickman.
He released songs including Goodnight with Lydia Jazmine, Cinderella with Anknown and Ayizulu, gradually building an identity beyond football.
Rather than remain tied to one sound, he continued experimenting. In 2024, he moved into hip-hop with Ndi Muto, an album that won Hip Hop Album of the Year. Now he is working on Yatula, an album focused on love music for weddings and introductions.
His music, he says, has evolved with his own experiences.
‘As I grew into the music journey, I loved the creative process of it, and then the character and personality started taking over the music I produce,’ he says.
But despite his success in music, Rickman never considered football a closed chapter. That is why his next career decision may come as a surprise.
He plans to stage his first and last concert in 2028 before eventually stepping away from music to pursue football coaching.
‘There is always a prime for everything,’ he says.
For Rickman, music has been an important chapter. Football, however, remains the book he has not finished.
Coming home
When he returned to Uganda in 2022, the desire to play professionally was still alive. His connection to football was also deeply personal.
His father played for KCCA FC, while Rickman himself trained with the club for two to three years. He also has childhood ties to Express FC, having played for the club’s academy. His return to Express FC was partly encouraged by his longtime friend DT Timo, whom he has known for nearly 20 years.
The two had played together as children, and Timo encouraged Rickman to return to the club where they had first shared their football dreams. Rickman began training with Express FC towards the end of the previous season. The club’s management encouraged him to take the opportunity seriously.
Then came another connection from his past. Morley Byekwaso, who had coached Rickman when he was about 11 or 12 years old, joined Express FC as head coach. For Rickman, the reunion carried a certain emotional weight. A coach from his childhood was now part of his return to senior football. It was almost as if the game had brought him back to where the journey began.
His comeback
Rickman’s return to competitive football reached a dramatic point when he made his Express FC debut against KCCA FC. He came on as a late substitute and scored in Express’s 2-0 victory. For a player whose football career had once been interrupted by a serious knee injury, the goal was significant. It was also symbolic.
He had returned to the pitch against KCCA FC , the club with which he has a family connection and where he himself had trained. The boy who once dreamt of making it in football had returned years later, carrying with him experiences from music, broadcasting and boxing. Football had waited. And Rickman had returned.
Then there was boxing
Football may have been his first love, but boxing has also been part of Rickman’s story since childhood.
Growing up in Kisenyi, he had friends who did boxing. Before his football coach arrived for training, he would sometimes join the boxers for a few minutes.
The fascination never disappeared.
Years later, he explored celebrity boxing and eventually became involved in corporate boxing, facing opponents from the music industry and social circles.
He credits Uganda Boxing Federation president Moses Muhangi with helping bring the idea to life.
Still, Rickman is careful about calling himself a boxer.
‘I don’t fully claim to be a boxer,’ he says.
What he does claim is a love for the sport and its lessons. His favourite boxer is American star Gervonta Davis, but his ambitions extend beyond his own participation. He wants to contribute to boxing and help the sport grow internationally.
Three worlds, one lesson
Balancing football, music and boxing is not easy.
Rickman admits scheduling can be difficult, but he does not see the three pursuits as competing for his attention. Instead, he believes they complement one another. Football teaches teamwork, discipline and individual brilliance. Music demands creativity, patience and individuality. Boxing requires commitment, resilience and mental toughness.
‘A boxer can teach commitment, discipline and resilience to a musician,’ he says. ‘A musician can teach creativity, lifestyle and patience to a boxer, while a footballer can teach all the above to both.’
The lessons from one discipline therefore travel into another. The patience required to build a music career can help an athlete deal with setbacks. The resilience learned in boxing can help a musician survive disappointment. And the discipline of football can shape both.
More than music
Rickman’s career has also expanded into broadcasting and film. He is a sports presenter at NRG Radio, hosting Offside every Saturday from 11am to 1pm and delivering daily sports updates on the station’s Transit Show. He has also ventured into film, featuring in Slumbomber.
Away from the public spotlight, however, Rickman describes himself as peaceful and mostly introverted, becoming more social when he feels comfortable. Faith remains important to him too and success is not simply fame.
‘Success is the fruits of preparation,’ he says.
Preparation, he believes, requires discipline, patience, training, teamwork, character, respect and perseverance. One piece of advice from a coach has stayed with him: ‘Do what you can do and let God do what you can’t do.’
Perhaps that philosophy explains his ability to keep starting again.
The next chapter
Rickman knows that every career has a season. He has considered stepping away from boxing. He understands that the music industry will continue changing and that younger artistes will eventually take over. But football remains different. It is the one passion he wants to carry beyond his playing career. His ambition is to become a professional coach.
He wants to win the Super League, be part of an Africa Cup of Nations campaign and eventually use his experience to guide younger players.
In music, he dreams of being part of a team that wins a Grammy and hopes to work with artists such as Joshua Baraka, Pasha Amaro and Dolv Gvng. His 2028 concert, meanwhile, is intended to give his fans a memorable farewell.
In boxing, he wants to support the sport in whatever way he can. For someone who has lived several careers, the ambitions may seem endless. But underneath them is one consistent desire: to leave something behind. Rickman does not want to be remembered simply as the musician who played football. Nor as the footballer who made music.
He wants the different parts of his life to tell one story.
A young boy from Kampala chased a football dream to Sweden. An injury interrupted that dream. Music gave him another path. Boxing tested his resilience. And now football has called him home. The journey has not been linear as he imagined as a child. Perhaps that is what makes it meaningful.