Wprld Cup qualifiers: Kenya vs. Ireland

Kenya came into this game looking for tyhe win that would guarantee their progression to the 2011 World cup against a team that had already guaranteed their own safe passage in the previuos round. Peter Ongondo and Nehemiah Odhiambo returned to the XI inplace of Seren Waters and Elijah Otieno. A defeat on the other hand would leave Kenya sweating on the other results on the day to preserve even their ODI status.

ist innings

Ireland, fielding quite a few reserve players inpreparationfor the WCQ Final, won the toss and chose to bat fast. they were confronted by a seam attack that was fire. Peter Ongondo and Thomas Odoyo quicky had three batsmen back in the pavilion with only 38 runs on the board. Ireland generally struggled to cope with these two as well as Nehemiah Odiambo and with Tikolo's four overs of finger-spin adding three wikets to their 4. Ireland hobbled to 204/9 off their 50 overs.



2nd innings

Kenya set off on their pusrduit on amarkedy quiet note, and given the sad batting performances of the past two games, caution would undoubtedly have been the watchword. Given the much smaller target that the Irish had set, they also had less pressure on their shoulders to get the job done withing the match itself. So when Kenya lost their first wicket for 17 and their second for 45 it did not reslult in the disintergration that had marked the previuos games as the Scorecard continued to rumble on at just less than 4 runs an over. When kenya they took the last powerplay they needed to score at close to 8 runs an over to see them selves home with Collins Obuya and Thomas Odoyo at the crease. But the two proved that they had more than enough musle to see Kenya home with 12 deliveries to spare.



implications
Kenya just miss out of aplace in the final of this tournament by the slimmest of margins. They now face The Netherlands in a mostly meaningless 3rd/4th place playoff on the 19th of April
In cricket terms Kenya book their place in the 2011 World Cup, but They also secure an automatic qualification for the Intercontinental Cup and ODI status for the next four years. It means they have the privilege to continue asking full members Bangladesh, Zimbabwe, Australia India et al) fully recognised One Day internationals (whether they respond positively is a whole nother matter). They also become one of 6 nations to participate in the World Cricket League Division 1, (date and venue to be confirmed) . In finacial terms they have earned a 3ook USD grant for being one of the ICC's HPP nations, and an extra 300k USD to prepare for the next World Cup.



Scorecard

World Cup Qualifiers: Kenya vs Namibia

Following two less than sub-par batting performances, Kenya finally brought down the axe to strengthen the batting. However, it was bowling allrounder, Nehemiah Odhiambo, who found himself tossed into the cold to make space for Seren Waters. aside from that there were bo other changes as Elijah Otieno's performance with the ball was good enough to keep him in the XI ahead of the veteran Peter Ongondo.

1st innings

Kenya won the toss again and this time opted to field first. However it seems that the demons that had plagued the batting had moved on to Kenya's bowling as Namibia's opening batsmen steamrolled their way to 191 before some sharp work behind the stumps from Maurice Ouma of Lameck Onyango's bowling saw the end of JB Burger. Burger left having scored an audaciuos 125 runs from 96 deliveries. The next four wickets came in far quicker as the namibian innings began to deflate and the spectre of Kenya chasing a 300+ began to fade. 2 run outs and wickets for hiren Varaiya and Thomas Odoyo reduced Namibia to 243/5 with 7 overs left in their innings. Namibia nevertheless rallied late on to 305 all out, setting Kenya a target of 306 to win

2nd innings

Kenya were immediately off to the races piling on the runs and despite the early loss of Kennedy Otieno, 27 runs off the first three overs, but Kenya's familiar batting woes would not go away as both Waters and Obanda ere out cheaply to leave Kenya 35/3 and from there it was all down hill as Kenya sunk to 104 all out to hand Namibia a enourmous 201 run victory. Only three batsmen, Maurice Ouma, Collins Obuya and Thomas Odoyo made it into double figures aand in the end the innings was over in 30 overs.


implications

The size of Kenya's defeat effectively wipes out the advantage of NRR that they had coming into the match leaves them in a perilous tied with two other teams (Netherlands, UAE) on 6 points fighting for that last qualifying place for the World Cup, ahead of their match against Ireland on the 17th.

Scorecard

Junior Rugby World Trophy

From the 21st of this week, Kenya will be hosting the IRB Junior Rugby World Trophy. this is an u20 tournaments featuring teams from Chile, Kenya, Korea, Paupau New Guinea, Namibia, cayman Islands and the USA.

As the first official IRB event to be hosted in Kenya it should be a massive boost to the standing of the local facilities and an oppotunity for Kenya's young stars to pit themselves against some of the best u20 talent in the World today

World Cup Qualifiers: Kenya vs Scotland

Kenya came into this match needing a solid performance to bury the ghosts of Saturday's shocking implosion with the bat against Canada. Even so, none of the batsmen involved in the deabacle was dropped as Kenya opted to keep the faith in their batting line up. In the bowling department. Elijah Otieno came in in plce of Peter Ongondo.

1st innings

Having won the toss, Kenya chose to tempt fate by batting first and though This time their openers were mare cautious guiding Kenya to 30/0 after 6 overs, thing started to take a worryingly familiar turn when they promptly lost 4 wickets in the space of four overs with only 19 runs scored. Once again it was down to kenya's middle and lower order to stop the rot. Collins Obuya (32 off 66 balls), Thomas Odoyo (26 of 72 balls) and James Kamande (18 of 29) once again reprising what must now be the annoyingly familiar role of digging Kenya out of yet another hole. Kenya being at 49/4 when the first of them went in to bat and 129/7 when Odoyo was the last of the three to depart. Kenya eventually manages 177 all out with Hiren Varaiya, and Nemi Odhiambo providing late entertainemnt each scoring 20.

2nd innings

Scotland's innings started on a rather quiet not with Odoyo and Otieno bowling tidily at the start. But given the low target they were chasing Scottish were under no pressure to score quickly. Nonethelss Keny'a bowler's stuck to their task and soon were rewarded whe Odoyo bowled Gavin Hamilton for 17. and soon after Kenya got a second wicket when Maurice Ouma was sharp enough to effect a stumping off a wide Lameck Onyango delivery. Then Scotland started to unravel. First, their captain Ryan Watson (1) was trapped infront of his crease by a Lameck Onyango delivery, then Colin Smith getting himself run out (9) and then Nehemiah Odhiambo getting an lbw decision to get rid of kyle Coetzer for 16 to leave Scotland at 65/5. Odhiambo struck again to leave the score 82/6. Nontheless Scotland battled on with Jan Stander nagging the tail onwards with Craig Wright offering support carrying the score to 130 before losing his wicket to leave Scotland needing 47 runs off their last three wickets to win the game. Stander was the next to go , with the Scots at 138. The Scots finally took their last powerplay with 5 overs left and just 30 for the win but promptly lost their last two wickets to Lameck Onyango.

implications

Kenya's batting suffred again but on this occasion the bowling stood up to be counted withe the Ngoche brothers (Lameck and Nehemiah) picking up 6 wickets to see Kenya home and just about hanging on to one of four World Cup places. (They are third on 6 points only ahead of the Dutch on Net run Rate and Scotland in 5th by 2 points). Their final two matches are against namibia (2 points) and group leaders Ireland

Just what is at stake in all this

Scorecard

Worls cup Qualifiers: Kenya vs Canada

Kenya's first match of the Super 8 stage and it was against a canada side that had won 4 out their 5 matches in their group. Kenya's regular XI were restorted for this match in which a win against one of two other teams on 4 points at the start of the Super 8s would be a big step forward in securing a place in the finals. Even Nehemiah Odhiambo was beack having recovered from whetevr ailment kept him out of the win against Bermuda.

1st innings

Kenya were sent in to bat and were soon in all sorts of turmoil as within 10 overs 5 batsmen had been dismissed for single figure scores and the entire innings was looking finished before it had even got started at 51 runs for the loss of 5 wickets. Ex-Ugandan Henry Osinde was the man doing the damage for Canada finishing with 4 wickets for 39 runs. Things would get worse before they got better as only 20 runs when Mautice Ouma, the only top order batsman to get his score past 10 suffered his customary head explosion and Kenya wer looking over the abyss with the score reading 71/6.
It was here that the two batsmen at the crease, Jimmy Kamande, and Hiren Varaiya, ostensibly in the XI for their ability to bowl finger-spin, began the firefighting exercise that dragged Kenya's final total to a barely excusable 181 all out. Kamande was the top scorer hitting a valuable 61 off 86 balls. Other firefighters were Hiren Varaiya who held out for 41 deliveries to get to 13. and nehemiah Odhiambo who hit 3 fours and a six before he was left stranded on an unbeaten score of 34 of 45 deliveries.

2nd innings

Canada ere off to the races chasing down an relitely easy target of of 182 with one Riwaz Cheema, in partcularly explosive form, dealing exclusively in boundaries for his first 38 runs. Canada were running away with the game scoring an astronomical 60 runs off 6 overs mostly off the back of Cheema's efforts. Kenya finally got the better of him when he lobbed a Nehemiah Odhiambo delivery to Alex Obanda to finish just one runs short of his 50. A second wicket with the Canadians on 83, slowed them further and even with Kamande's spin picking up a further Kenya's poor batting earlier proved their downfall.

implications

Following 4 solid batting performances against fairly docile attacks Kenya have certainly been brought back to earth with an enourmous thump. Hopefully it will be a wake up call to the batsmen to raise their collective game ahead of matches against Scotland, Namibia and finally Ireland
EDIT: Fortunately for Kenya, the group leaders Ireland also lost their opening day match against Afghanistan meaning that though they (Kenya) slip out of the two finalist slots, The two teams at the top of the pool remain only two points ahead of Kenya with three matches to play.
Scorecard

Are we not learning?

Was reading through a piece in the Daily Nation regarding the recent gates from the World Cup Qualifier match between Kenya and Tunisia at the newly rebranded Coca Cola National stadium and this particular paragraph struck me

Of the 27,000 tickets offered for sale, 24,507 were taken up by the public translating to 22,513 terrace tickets sold from the 24,000 on offer and 1,996 centre stand tickets sold from 3,000 on offer.

The figures, however, do not seem to tally with the actual attendance of the match which showed a crowd well beyond the 30,000 capacity at the Coca-Cola National Stadium.

“No one can verify how many people the stadium (Coca-Cola) can hold,” FKL senior vice chairman Titus Kasuve said. Even though Coca-Cola stadium lacks seats, official records of Sports Stadia Management Board, the managers of the facility, indicate that it’s official capacity stands at 30,000.

Just in the first weekend of KPL action a match involving AFC Leopards and Nairobi City Stars saw a near disaster as the stadium was reported to have been flooded up to twice its capacity and it was at this very stadium that a stampede broke out costing the the life of one 15 year old fan. Now if the KFF/FKL (whoever is incharge these days) is capable of producing detailed reccords of who has official ticket and therefore has official permission to enjoy Kenyn football from inside the stadium how do all these extra fans (nothing agaisbt their passion to support our boys) keep getting access?

the article in question, incase you would like to have a read

World Cup Qualifiers : Kenya vs Denmark.

With pretty much nothing riding on this game,Kenya made three changes bringing in Rakep Patel, Rajesh bhudia and Seren Waters, in and giving James Kamande, Thomas Odoyo and Lameck Onyango a rest. For the Danes it was a last opportunity to walk away from tournaments with at least one win under their belts, whilst Kenya's motivation would be the extra NRR they would get for a win.

1st innings

Having won the toss Steve Tikolo sent in the Danes and they duly began to collapse, with Elijah Otieno picking two early wickets and Obanda occasioning a run out to leaving the Danes at 4 wickets down for only 52 runs scored. Their scoring never really picked up any momentum and they eventually crawled to 173/8 from their 50 overs. Elijah Otieno had the best bowling figures returning 3/51 from his 10 overs, with Peter Ongondo, Steve Tikolo, and hiren varaiya all getting a wicket each.

2nd innings

As expected Kenya started brightly rapidly accumulating 34 before Ouma edged one behind to walk for 24 (perhaps a trend that he has consistently been Kenya's 1st wicket to fall). That mishap, however harly slowed kenya down as they continued smoothly on to 100 Seren waters and Collins Obuya at the crease. The pair eventually saw Kenya home with waters scoring 61.

implications

Kenya thus finish round one top of Group B and carry with them 4 points from victories over fellow qualifiers (Afghanistan and UAE) into the Super 8 stage. There they will play Ireland (6 points), Canada (4 points), Scotland (2 points), Namibia (0 points) with the top two teams at the end of this stage contesting the final and the third and forth placed teams getting tthe last two World cup slots available to Associates.

Scorecard

World Cup Qualifiers: Kenya vs Bermuda

With the momentum in the group now frimly refained, Kenya went into this match against a Bermuda team with only one win in the tournament expected to make short work of their opponents and confirm their place in the Super 8 with a match to spare. Elijah Otieno made his tournament debut in place of Nehemian Odhiambo, who pulled out injured bowling against Afghanistan, whilst the rest of the team remained largely unchanged.

1st innings

Bermuda, having been sent in after losing the toss, set about trying to build a total in the old fashioned way i.e slow and steady, taking 30 overs to get to 100, but they till had 9 wickets in hand (Varaiya doing the damage removing Ian? Crockwell for a 89 ball 45). bermuda then finally decided to attack with a succession of batsmen scoring rapid 30s before getting out. All the while their other opener, David Hemp, a player of over 15 years experience held the fort compiling a 102 from 152 balls that would not have looked out of place in a test match as Bermuda reached 259/5 off their alloted overs.

2nd innings.

As it were ODI cricket is not Test cricket and Kenya's opebers (Maurice Ouma in particular) set about Bermuda's pace bowlers with all out aggression putting on the first 50 runs off just under 7 overs and forcing the Bermuda captain to bring on his spinners early to stem the tide. The run rate slowed but only slightly as Kenya's opening partnership eventually putting on 97 before Ouma was out (57 off 60). Obanda fell soon afterwards going after one too many sixes. With the veterans Tikolo and Otieno at the crease however, the Kenya chase was not hampereed as they put on a further 56 runs at 6 runs an over for the 3rd wicket. When Otieno was finally adjudged to be lbw for 63 the game was virtually safe.

implications

kenya's third win in a row guarantees them qualification for the Super 8 stages and with their final match being against Denmark having little consequence given the Dane's have lost all their matches so far, it might be the time to give some of the squad members a chance to see how they deal with the conditions. Rakep Patel and Rajesh Bhudia have yet to play a competive match (except as fielding substitutes) whilst Seren Waters could benefit from a second game.

Scorecard

Drama at African Clubs Championship

Drama struck at the Africa Club Championships as two of Kenya's three representatives look to have been shown the door over player issues. Following the signing of several of their players to clubs in the United Arab Emirates, the Confederation of African Volleyball moved to have Kenya Pipeline and Kenya Prisons forfeit their quarterfinals matches on the grounds that they no longer had enough players to reach the minimum requirement of 10 needed to participate at thye competition in Nairobi.

With Kenyan officials crying foul at the decision made by Ugandan Control Committee President, Tom Omongole it certainly thrown the whole tournament into chaos given the two clubs involved would have been amongst the favourites to win the whole thing.

The players said to have signed for teams in Dubai were listed by the east African Standard as Jane Wacu and Esther Mwombe for Prisons, Lucy Chege, Janet Wanja and Asha Makuto from Pipeline. The club tournament, normally dominated by teams from Kenya, Tunisia and Egypt , with a place at the World Club championship at stake for the winners.



Kenya's other representatives in the competition, Kenya Commercial Bank, were unaffected by the ruling and will proceed with their quarterfinals.

World Cup qualifiers : Kenya vs. Afganistan

Kenya finally got a go at the World cricket league's hottest news item when they played Afganistan. Having sensationally come all the way through 3 different qualifying tournaments winning all three and only losing two matches along the way, its was certainly going to be interesting how the new boys held up against Kenya, the most experienced ICC assiciate on the block. kenya's lineup reamined largely unchanged from Thursday, with Maurice Ouma opening alongside Kennedy Otieno, Alex Obanda batting at number three and Seren Waters, once again missing out.

1st innings

Having won the toss Afghanistan sent Kenya in to bat and though not batting rapidly, Kenya's openers put on 87 for the first wicket before Ouma lost his wicket for 35 runs. However Kenya's batting was looking far more solid with Obanda and Otieno taking the score to 175, before Obanda was caught and bowled by Norooz Mangal, having scored 60 off just 63 deliveries. Kennedy Otieno would go on to complete his first century of the tournament (an unbeaten 109 off 136) anchoring Kenya to a total of 282/5.

2nd innings

Afghanistan opened their innings on an aggressive note scoring 20 runs off the first three overs with Thomas Odoyo coming in for some heavy hitting. However Kenya struck back almost immediately when Ongondo had Karim Sadiq caught by Otieno fo 8. Odoyo then bowled Mohhameed Shezad for 4. Odoyo then went on to take the next two wickets trapping Shafiqullah on his crease lbw (25) and then forcing Norwoz Mangal to edge a delivery to wicketkeeper Maurice Ouma. From then on Kenya were pretty much in charge and the Afghans evntually subsided to 175 all out with tjhe only consolation being Mohammed Nabi's 56 off 71 balls.


implications

With the Dutch staring at a shock defeat against UAE, Kenya are back on the front foot in this group. Should the Arabs sneak through into the Super 8s together with the other likely teams in good form in the group to qualify (The Netherlands and Afghaistan) Kenya will start the Super 8s with at least 4 points in the bag. However,they have to make sure they do not slip up.

Scorecard

World cup Qualifiers:Kenya v. UAE

Alex Obanda made his return to the XI with Maurice Ouma further promoted to open the batting alongside, rival for the wicketkeeping duties, Kennedy Otieno. Seren waters was the man making way at the top of the order as the bowling unit remained largely the same. As it was Obanda hradly got to face a delivery as Kenya marched home in style chasing a paltry 80 runs in 12 overs to win by 9 wickets. to do their net runrate a world of good

1st innings

Batting first, the arabs were no match for the Kenyan pace attack led by Lameck Onyango, who collected career best list A bowling figures of 6 wickets for 14 runs of his ten overs allocation. Only two UAE batsmen got into double figures as their team collapes in a heap 79 all out in 30 overs.

2nd innings

Opening once again Maurice Ouma finished what Lameck had started blasting 50 off 38 deliveries to deliver Kenya to the brink of victory before getting out lbw with only 10 runs to go.

implications

An especially comfortable victory for Kenya means that in the highly unlikely event that the Dutch slip up against the rest of the cannon fodder in the group Kenya may yet emerge top and if Kenya mop up the rest of the oppiosiyion with this kind of proffesionalism they may yet nullyfy the disadvantage of losing their opening match against the Dutch.

Kenya now have a rest day before they take on the tournament's media darlings Afghanistan, who whilst may not be as strong as the Dutch will certainly be a sterner test that the UAE today.
Scorecard

Worl Cup Qualifiers:Kenya v. Netherlands

Taking the cue from my counterparts I will be be posting brief summaries of the games as Kenya looks to qualify for thr 2011 cricket World Cup.

For those of you who do not know Kenya are in group B with The Dutch, UAE, Bermuda, Denmark and Afghanistan. The top four who qualify for the Super 8 where ther business of ends up where is finaally settled.

So into the action

Game 1 v. Holland
With the mercurial Alex Obanda missing the first game Morris Ouma was pushed up the order to fill his position batting at three. Kenya opt for the extra bowler in thye shape of veteran Lameck Onyango. Giving the team the option of four pace bowlers (Odoyo, Ongondo, Odhiambo, Onyango) as well as the spin option of Tikolo, Varaiya and Kamande.

1st innings
Having won the toss Steve Tikolo opted to bat first, But Kenya soon had both openers back in the pavilion for single figures as the Dutch bowlers made good use of the new ball and by the 17th over Kenya were 4 wickets down with only 61 runs scored with an implosion looking likely. However with Thomas Odoyo(36 off 73 balls) Collins Obuya (24 off 58 balls) digging in to carry Kenya into triple digits, the worst was avoided and when Jimmy Kamande came on an pile to score a heavily adrenaline charged 58 runs off 50 deliveries, allied to some lusty hitting from Nemi Odhiambo (29 off 17 with 2 sixes), Kenya were able to battle their way to a failry competitive 247/8 off their allocated 50 overs.

2nd innings

The Dutch beging their chase fairly slowly Ongondo and Odoyo, doing well to keep them from making much use of their first two powerplays. The change of bowling brought early reward for Kenya with the introduction of Lameck Onyango and Nemi Odhiambo sparkimg a mini-collapse. But just as it looked like Kenya were about to land a killer blow, The Dutch struck back through Bas Ziuderent and Ryan Ten Doeschate hitting 13 of Varaiya's first over and then a further 14 of Odhiambo's 6th to put themselves right back in the game and with rain looming the advantage through Duckworth-Lewis ( the score being128/3). From then on it was just a matter of keeping the scorecard ticking over which they managed despite the best efforts of Kenya's spinners to stem the scoring. What could have been a hard fought chase then gradually became a procession as Both Zuiderant and Ten Doeschate (distinctly a class above anyone else on the field) raised their 50s as The Dutch crossed 200 hundred with 10 overs to spare, before Ten doeschate confirmed his class by crossing 100 with only few runs left to get to guide the Dutch across the line to an easy 7 wicket win.

Implications

Though Netherlands are a long way the most difficult opposition Kenya will face in this group, the likelybility that the Dutch will go on and steamroll everybody else in the group means that if bothe go through as is likelythe Dutch will have the extra two points in the pocket right from the off (as will Ireland from their victory over Scotland if scotland go through). Which with the higher quality opposition anticipated in the super 8 stage means Kenya will need to raise their standards a level or two by then.

Scorecard here