Gor mahia face Mathare United

By GILBERT WANDERA

The Kenyan Premier League (KPL) Top 8 tournament resumes on Wednesday and it is an opportunity for Mathare United to post a positive result in what is turning out to be a terrible season for the 2008 KPL champions.

There are two matches at Nyayo National Stadium this evening. The first fixture pits league champions Ulinzi against Karuturi Sports in a 5.30pm kick-off.

The second match will see Gor Mahia take on Mathare United from 7.30pm with both fixtures shown live on DTSV channel SuperSport 209.

A lot of interest will no less be on the second match where Gor will be attempting to build on their good results and United try to pick themselves up from a bad start.

Mathare United's Kevin Kimani and Rangers Juma Abdalla during a KPL tie. [PHOTO: BONIFACE OKENDO/STANDARD]

Gor who are third in the KPL standings go into today’s fixture with extra motivation after landing a multi-million-sponsorship deal from Tuzo.

The two-year sponsorship will be announced next week and it marks the first time that the club has landed a corporate sponsor in their history.

This and together with their current top form in the league should provide enough motivation for Gor going into today’s knock-out fixture, which gives them another opportunity to earn more money this season.

Gor are expected to be at full strength as midfielders Kevin Omondi and Collins Okoth are back in the team after sitting out Sunday’s 1-0 win over KCB.

Even in the absence of the two key midfielders their replacements Tony Onyango and Francis Ocholla were very impressive and this may give coach Zedekiah Otieno plenty of options going into the match. This is probably not the right time for United to be playing such a high profile match. Lying 14th in the standings the former KPL champions have had one of the worst starts to the seasons and boast of only one win in five matches.

On a positive note, United may look at this fixture as an opportunity to revive their faltering fortunes this season.

The winner of today’s fixture qualifies automatically to the semi-finals and will be in line for the Sh1 million prize money.

In the other match, Ulinzi will be hoping to go on with their winning ways as they face a stubborn Karuturi side who are desperate for their first silverware.

The soldiers stopped United 2-0 at the weekend, which was only their second win of the season but it turned around what had been until then a bad start in 2011.

Karuturi also won 2-0 against lowly placed Congo United and appear to be in the mood to extend their winning run.