END OF THE ROAD: Kenya crash out of the Bowl semis in Scotland IRB leg

RUGBY
Dylan Collier of New Zealand on the attack with four Kenyan defenders ready to pounce during the IRB Scotland leg at the weekend. [PHOTO:IRB]

The Kenya National Sevens Team finished their Scotland Sevens campaign with five points after reaching the Bowl Semi finals of the tournament.

The team finished day one of the tournament on Saturday night with a resounding 29-22 victory over Samoa through tries courtesy of Humphrey Kayange, Dennis Ombachi and Dan Sikuta in a fast-paced match that saw the two teams exchange the lead on several occasions.

Both teams had earlier lost to South Africa and New Zealand in the other group matches, which meant despite the victory, Kenya and Samoa were both relegated to the Bowl quarterfinals, where Kenya was to play Portugal on Sunday morning.

Kenya continued with the winning form against Samoa by beating Portugal 12-0 in a tight match.

Two tries from Collins Injera and Billy Odhiambo saw them qualify for the Bowl semi-finals against Argentina.

It was a tournament for mixed results for the side, as when they just thought they had gotten a string of good results under their belt, the home boys succumbed to their first defeat of the second day against Argentina, which was the killer blow that also saw them kicked out of the tournament.

Even though Kenya held their own in the first half of the game, where a Collins Injera-try had the teams level at 7-7 at half time, the team slowly disintegrated in the second half to concede three tries that saw the game end at 22-7 in favour of Argentina.

It's now back to the drawing board for the Kenya 7s team as they hold 38 points in the table with only one more leg to go in the circuit.

The teams now head to England for final tournament of the circuit. Kenya looks unlikely to be relegated and they are likely focused on getting their systems right for qualification to the Olympics through the regional qualifiers.

A men's and a women's team will qualify from each of the six regional Olympic-qualification tournaments, that will take place between June and November 2015.

Johannesburg will play host to the African women's and men's qualifiers. Kenya's Lionesses will look to secure Olympic qualification on September 26 and 27, while the men who will not make the top four when the current series season draws to a close will target qualification on November 14 and 15 in the City of Gold.

The 12th and final place in both the men's and women's Olympic Games rugby sevens competitions will be determined via a World Rugby final tournament, which will take place before the end of June 2016.

Last season Kenya dropped out of the Plate final.