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The Nairobian

Kenya suffers a 40-0 drubbing in the hands of Fiji

Politics

By The Standard Sports | Mar 27, 2011

By BS Mulavi in Hong Kong

National Sevens rugby coach Benjamin Ayimba is as baffled as fans why the team is losing badly in the ongoing Hong Kong-leg of the IRB Sevens Circuit.

The team was relegated to the Bowl tournament after two humiliating defeats, first going down to Russia 22-5 on the first day and falling to Fiji 40-0 yesterday, with both loses coming from a string of errors and lax defending from the players.

Speaking to Feverpitch after the game, a disenchanted Ayimba asked the players to start owning the team and put their potential into practice.

"I think its time the players started taking responsibility," Ayimba lamented.

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"It is very hard for me as a coach to explain why a player will knock on the ball or pass it forward. It is time they told me what exactly is going on in the games because we have been training well but when we get to the pitch, we keep making small mistakes," he added dejectedly.

Kayange rues mistakes

Team captain Humphrey Kayange rued individual mistakes, which he said dragged down the whole team.

"The game against Fiji went against our expectations and we have not been playing well, but we just have to keep pushing and try to improve no matter how bad it looks," he said.

However, assistant coach Felix Ochieng’ has vowed to press on in the Shield title today when they play Malaysia at 4am.

"The boys know we need to push on and we are not going to sulk over our previous performance. For us, it is back to business."

Ochieng termed the Hong Kong leg ‘very competitive’ and a tough place to play in since there are six pools and only the top team in the group is fully guaranteed a place in the Main Cup quarter-finals. "It does not help to be number two unless you have a very good aggregate after which you can have an outside chance of qualifying as the best two number two sides," he explained.

"That means you can win both games and still drop out of the tournament, which explains why there are still some tough teams in the Bowl category."

he expounded further. Ayimba has, however, termed today’s game ‘hard to plan’, as the team has not being executing their game plan in recent times. The Sevens Head Coach might decide to give some of the new players a start in today’s matches as the Shield tournament holds no weight in terms of points.