By Gilbert Wandera
NAIROBI; KENYA: Egyptian side ENPPI fight out a goalless draw at Nyayo to keep alive their continental football ambition
Gor bowed out of the Confederations Cup after failing to overturn a 3-0 first leg deficit against Egyptian side ENNPI at Nyayo Stadium, on Saturday.
The return match ended in a barren draw, allowing the visitors to go through on a three goal aggregate and continue another dominance of Egyptian clubs over their Kenyan counterparts.
Despite bowing out early, Gor will be proud of their performance on Saturday as they created more chances and were the better side in both halves.
It was the visitors, however, who threatened first. Ahmed Moustafa found space inside the Gor after just nine minutes but his shot was stopped by Jerim Onyango.
Two minutes later, the player again got space to shoot at goal, but Onyango came to the rescue. Ten minutes later, Dan Sserunkuma scored for Gor after completing a Rama Salim pass, but the goal was disallowed after the Ugandan was judged to have pushed Ibrahim Zahnya who knocked down his own goalkeeper Mohammed Al Monsef.
It took seven minutes for the goalkeeper to be treated before the match resumed and, when it did, Gor had a free kick near the opponents’ goal, but Kevin Omondi wasted it.
Just after the half hour mark, Christopher Wekesa came to Gor’s rescue with a wonderful clearance from an Abdalla Salim effort. Three minutes later, Rama Salim was denied by the visitor’s goalkeeper Monsef after he had beaten the defence.
Ram who was coming back into the match after injury was in top form and, in the 41st minute, Mohammed Sobhy earned a yellow card for obstructing the Gor striker.
Sobhy was stopped by Onyango in the Gor goal from an injury time effort. Gor, however, ended the first half on a high after Ali Abondo found a Rama Salim pass but he was in too much of a hurry to shot and the effort went wide.
causing chaos
Gor Mahia players and fans were clearly not happy with the officiating and they made it clear at half-time protesting at the match referee who was accosted by the Gor goalkeeper after he blew the whistle for the end of the first half.
Gor chairman Ambrose Rachier was forced to address the fans and warn them about the dangers of causing chaos as this would attract a ban. On rsesumption, it was Gor who were on the offensive with Ssrenkuma winning a corner after he failed to score.
It was one of the seven corners Gor forced, but, in the end, they could not amount to much as the club bowed out of the competition early for the second time in a row.
Despite the result Gor coach Zradvko Logarusic was a happy man and said they just lacked a special quality player to turn things around for them.
“Before this game, I had said we want to make Kenyans happy despite the pedigree of our opponents. Today we did everything possible but lacked that special quality of a player to finish off the game for us,” he told reporters.
