Let's win back football players in Diaspora

As Divock Origi stroked a quickly taken corner past a shocked Barcelona goalkeeper to send Liverpool through to the Champions League final, it got me thinking about local sporting teams. Divock is the son of Michael Okoth Origi, who, for the sake of younger readers, played for Kenya 120 times from 1989 until 2004, scoring 28 times, and spent a big part of his career playing in Belgium. While his father was playing for KV Oostende, Divock was born and bred in the Western European nation.

In 2013, as Divock was plying his trade for French Ligue 1 side Lille, the Football Kenya Federation (FKF) tried to convince him to play internationally for Kenya. He had not even turned 18. “This is a very promising lad. We are all aware that the main problem with the national team, and even the local league is the striking department. We cannot afford to lose this boy, as he has a long successful career ahead of him and we want it to be with the Harambee Stars,” Kenya FA’s head of technical committee Elly Mukolwe said at the time.