Simbas choke at the last minute: 15s team fail to win when it matters as they miss ticket to 2015 Rugby World Cup

Kenya Rugby Union officials are fighting over the leadership of the union body.

The Kenya National Fifteens team chocked under pressure in Madagascar to lose their crown as African champions.
Having won their first two games of the tournament 29-22 over Namibia and 34-0 over Madagascar, Kenya had amassed a total of 10 points which meant they only needed one point in their last fixture against Zimbabwe to top the pool.
To get a minimum of one point Kenya needed to either score four tries or lose by a margin of less than seven points. However this was not to be the case as they lost 27-10 to Zimbabwe to tumble from first position to third due to aggregate.
This will be a particularly painful loss as Kenya went into the match as favourites in the tournament by virtue of being the African champions and also the team that had the unbeaten run. Kenya’s tactics in their final game will particularly come into question given how close they were to qualification.
First the selection of the starting team warranted some questions with the exclusion of players like Andrew Amonde, who was particularly good in the past two games. Amonde started on the bench in what was a do or die match.
When it came to the game-plan, Kenya did not play like a side that was defending a lead in the table, instead they easily kicked away the ball with Lavin Asego the main culprit and played in the wrong territories of the pitch which gifted the Zimbabweans more possession.
When it came to decision making Kenya failed to adapt to the conditions on the ground, where instead of kicking for points in the penalties they instead opted to kick for set-pieces such as line-outs which they were evidently struggling against the Zimbabweans.
Overall the Kenyans choked and despite an inspirational try from Humphrey Kayange they did not have enough to fight against their opponents who seemed hungrier for victory.
Now it is back to the drawing board for the Kenya Rugby Union who have another four years to study the result from this year’s competition and plot accordingly for the next Rugby World Cup.

Meanwhile Namibia secured a slot to next year’s World Cup in England after demolishing hosts Madagascar in the second match of the day on Sunday.

At the same time Zimbabwe who beat Kenya will have a chance of also qualifying for the World Cup but they face a play-off against Russia in Siberia.