Kenya: Eagles Next for the Stars

Nairobi Star (Nairobi)

Francis Wadegu

28 March 2011

Kenya’s Harambee stars face Nigeria on Wednesday in an international friendly encounter with renewed belief after their breathtaking come from behind win over Angola in an African Cup of Nations Group “J” qualifier on Saturday.

Kenya skipper Dennis Oliech however, will miss the Nigerian date due to club commitments. His place has been given to Western Stima’s Alois Maingi.

Harambee Stars had barely any time to savour the win over Angola as they departed for Lagos on Saturday night minus Inter Milan midfielder MacDonald Mariga, his younger brother Victor Mugabe and goalkeeper Arnold Origi who were due to join them yesterday

A victory over the Super Eagles following their win over Angola will further improve Kenya’s ranking in world football Stars 2-1 win over Angola was their first in the group and revived their fledgling hopes of making it to the tournament proper in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea next year “We are confident we can make it if we win all our next matches. The players have shown they are capable of beating anyone,” beamed stars coach Zedekiah Otieno

Stars started the match slowly and had to clear the ball on the line in the third minute before finally Manucho rammed the ball home past an impressive Arnold Origi before two inspired second half substitutions turned the game on its head. “We wanted to have players on the field who could hold the ball and deny the Angolans the ball so we could create our own chances for the strikers,” was Otieno’s explanation for the changes.

Jamal Mohammed, who together with Mugabe came onto the match seven minutes into the second half, scored the leveller after Dennis Oliech’s effort had been parried back into play by the Angolan custodian.”I had the confidence that we could win the match. The coach had instructed us to put pressure on the Angolans in their own half and I’m grateful to God it paid of,” said Jamal, the man fondly referred to us “Malo” by his fans.

Mariga who had earlier hit the upright completed the turnaround three minutes from time with a ferocious thunderbolt that slammed the back of the net to the delight of the thousands of fans, among them Prime Minister Raila Odinga.

Kenya now lie second in the group three points behind group leaders Uganda who continued their impressive form with a 1-0 win away in Guinea Bissau.

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