Regular reader 'Topspinner' writes:
Ref: Search for new coach (Nation, July 13, author Richard Mwangi)
The political agenda still seems to run with Mwangi; and I tell you, it rankles! In an otherwise quite fair (for him) report, he refers to a ‘whitewash’ in Dublin. It was not a ‘whitewash’; Kenya lost 0-3, but twice this was due to the vagaries of the Duckworth/Lewis method. The scores were as follows (because The Nation never saw fit to record them): 1. Kenya 214 (50 overs), Ireland 215 for 7 (48.5); 2. Kenya 175 (45.1), Ireland 104 for 1 (21) – lost by 57 runs under D/L; 3. Ireland 256 for 7 (50), Kenya 240 for 6 (46) – lost by four runs (D/L). Any study of this shows that the last result, in particular, was very unfair under the D/L method. Kenya finished only 16 runs behind and yet, under normal rules, would have had another 24 balls to get 17 to win! As it was, Collins Obuya needed to score a six off the last ball, which he failed to do. And it needs to be emphasised that, under Morris Ouma (capt) and Jimmy Kamande (v-capt) – nice Luo/Kikuyu combination – Kenya played pretty well in the four-day game at Eglinton, were well managed and, indeed, appeared well coached whatever the Jasmir Singh report may say. This team has got a nice balance and, after years in the doldrums, looks like it has the potential to go places, as long as it watches out for Uganda coming up on the rails! Let’s hope also that Zimbabwe put out a proper side. As kenyacricket.com says, it would be fruitless if Zimbabwe were merely to use Intercontinental Cup matches as a ratchet to get back into the mainstream of cricket. We would in that case be better off playing Namibia and UAE.
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3 comments:
Its was a whitewash.Lets stop sugar coating Kenya's performance. We barely qualified for the world cup, didn't come close to qualifying for twenty20 world cup. There is also no need to bring tribalism here - Luo/Kikuyu combination...staying on the tribalism theme...why was Varaiya not selected for the ICUP match against Ireland?
I think the point being made is that there is progress that has been made under this new leadership, yet all we ever see from the press is negativity. Both sides of the coin have to be shown which does not happen.
The problem with some commentators, which is ok as this is a developing cricket nation, is that they don't have a good experience of cricket so they don't fully understand how it works. I fully understand what the author of the article is trying to say. In essence Kenya played well and it was encouraging, There's hope with the new structure and so we look forward with better hopes. The new captain did a good job and the rest of the players supported him well. I thought the team made one blunder when in the 1st ODI when the replaced Steve Tikolo with Hiren Varaiya when Tikolo was the best bowler and this probably lost us the match if not made the win easier for Ireland. Being that it was the first match with a new captain we can only hope that they get better with more experience working together like this.
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