Kenyan volleyballers find going tough in Egypt

Kenya men’s volleyball team hopes of qualifying for this year’s FIVB Men’s World Cup in Japan were dented on Friday when they suffered their second consecutive defeat in the ongoing African Nations Championship at the Cairo Stadium Complex, in Egypt.

Kenya lost in straight sets of 25-17, 28-26 and 25-23 to Algeria in a Pool A match that lasted for 86 minutes.

The loss came barely two days after they lost by the same margin (25-17, 28-26, 25-23) to favourites and the 2015 FIVB World League Group Three winners Egypt in their opening match on Wednesday.

With that victory Algeria improved their win- loss ratio to 2-0 to secure a semi-final ticket, while the Geoffrey Omondi’s boys dropped to 0-2. Algeria join Egypt in the last four, after the hosts’ straight sets victories over Kenya and Botswana.

Opposite spiker Toufik Mahdjoubi and outside hitter Mohamed Chikhi led the scorers for the North Africans, while Michael Chemos was Kenya’s best scorer after hitting 17 points.

The Philip Maiyo captained side was very competitive to the Algerians especially in the second set that showed the best rallies of the match with both sides exchanging the leads, but the experience of the Algerian hitters won them the set. It was the same situation in the third set that saw

Algeria narrowly claim it 25-23. Against the Egyptians on Wednesday, Ahmed Salah emerged the top scorer with 12 points in a match that lasted less than 69 minutes, while Philip Maiyo scored ten points. Kenya was due to play Botswana in their last Pool A match yesterday at the Cairo Stadium Complex.

In other matches played on Friday, Mohamed Hachdadi produced a man of the match performance as Morocco complicated the situation in Pool B after they beat Cameroon 3-1 (25-18, 21-25, 30-28, 25-21) in a thrilling encounter.

Tunisia overcame Mauritius easily 3-0 (25-13, 25-13, 25-7) in the other pool match. Morocco lead the pool with six points from 2-0, followed by Cameroon five points from 2-1.

Tunisia have garnered four points from 1-1, followed by Rwanda three points from 1-1 while Mauritius are rooted at the bottom with no point. The top two teams in the tournament will represent the continent at the World Cup in Japan in September