Where are the now? Many would ask. February 27 marked a historic night for Kenya’s football as our boys played against an English Premier League club, Hull City, in a friendly match televised across Africa. And recently Harambe stars coach Sebastian Migne revealed the Provisional squad that will be going 2019 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) and African Nations Championship (Chan)and surprisingly not, only two players out of 46 that traveled to England made it to the AFCON squad. Patrick Matasi who is currently playing in Saint George S.CEthiopia and Allan Wanga from Kakamega Homeboyz are the lucky two that impressed Migne.
Maybe this will answer why that happened, why just two footballers?
With all the talk of building the capacity of our youth with the coach Stanley Okumbi, the man entrusted with leading the team in the game badly betrayed the spirit by fielding mostly players who will definitely no longer be part of the national team in the coming three years or so.
It is not every day that you will have events of such magnitude. The SportPesa All-Stars were defeated 1-2 with Tusker midfielder Humphrey Mieno scoring the consolation.
The anger from the fans was particularly drawn from the fact that Okumbi was presented with the chance to test one of Kenya’s raw upcoming talents, Joshua Otieno, the 16–year-old Kakamega High School student at the time, but the coach waited until the final minute.
Of the 11 players out there on that cold night, only five could be termed prospects for the future – the central defense pairing of Harun Shakava and Robinson Kamura, Cliff Kasuti and Amos Nondi in midfield and John Makwata upfront. The rest have their better days behind them.
Here is the squad which played against Hull City: Patrick Matasi, James Situma, Robinson Kamura, Haron Shakava, Wesley Onguso, Humphrey Mieno, Cliff Kasuti, Allan Wanga, Amos Nondi, Mark Makwata, Osborne Monday.
Subs: David Okello, Christopher Oruchum, Geoffrey Kataka, Moses Odhiambo, Haron Nyakha, Joshua Otieno, Samuel Ndung’u.
And he is the 2019 AFCON Harambee Stars Provisional Squad.
