Kenya: Local Football in Tatters And Crying for Serious Change

Nairobi Star (Nairobi)

Dickens Olewe

2 July 2011

column

It has been a sad week for football in Kenya. The defeat by Sudan in the LG Cup felt like a hard blow to the stomach. However, the clincher was the Under-23 team’s 5-1 thumping by Uganda in the All Africa Games qualifier first leg at the Nyayo Stadium.

A lot has been said of what ails the widely supported game but what’s clear is that football management in Kenya has taken a path which can only be described as worrying. If the current state of affairs is endorsed in the August 13 football election, then football oblivion will be the destination.

Kenya marked a defining moment last year with the passing of the new constitution. The Kenyan people chose accountability and transparency over the old ways of sycophancy and laissez-faire. The aspirations of the Kenyan people is to embrace progress and reject the corrupt old ways. The wheels of change are turning but it seems football management is hell-bent to remain in the dark ages. The change which we aspire for as a nation should not leave sport behind.

The management of the Harambee Stars has over the years ticked all the boxes in as far as incompetence is concerned. Recent happenings have compounded the situation to the detriment of the national team. The abrupt inclusion of the LG Cup into the fixture and the public fighting and antagonism between the Harambee Stars Board and Football Kenya Limited (FKL) depicts a malaise in football administration.

The coaching staff is also not short of amusement. It’s not professional to include players who had been omitted from the squad two days before playing a match. The inclination for sporadic and streetwise ways of doing things maybe convenient but it undermines the importance of structures and policies that provide the essential guide of how to manage a team professionally.

The Kenya under 23 defeat sent a strong and unequivocal message. The future of football is grim. Prayers will not remedy the mess in Kenyan football but voting in people who view football as an end and not as means towards political ambition and winning business deals will rescue the game from sinking further.

I was impressed that Bob Williamson, Uganda’s national team coach was involved with their under-23 team. His hands-on approach shows that he’s a tactician who understands that the strength of national team lies in upcoming youngsters. No doubt Uganda gave us a football lesson on and off the pitch.

Crucially, if football is to make progress, then it needs to rid itself from some diehard habits like having the national team in camp for up to three weeks before an international fixture. This idea is plainly ridiculous. International players the world over manage to play for their clubs and honour international duty in the space of a week. So special about the Kenyan national team?

Finally, it was in the news recently that the British home nations are bitterly against playing as a united football team under the British banner in the 2012 Olympics. Individually, the home nations have struggled to make an impression in international tournaments. England has not stopped crowing about the 1966 World Cup triumph and bemoaning Maradona’s ‘hand of god’ which they still feel cheated them from securing the 1986 World Cup. Despite the ‘sensitive’ identity issues that the home nations have, one has to admit that under the British flag, Britain would have had a strong team. Ironically, no one’s complaining about representation in other sport in the Olympics and interestingly Andy Murray, a Scot, has the support of Britain in his quest to win the Wimbledon Grand Slam. Confused? I am.

Dickens Olewe is a football analyst. He comments on local and international football

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