Under 17 Trials next 3 days

Trials for the national Under 17s team will be held at Ruaraka Sports Club over the next three days as Cricket Kenya look to name a side to play in the Africa zone finals at the end of the month. Kenya will host the three team event which also includes Namibia and Ghana who won their respective regional tournaments.

After the dissapointment of the U19 and U13 teams earlier this year, this is a chance for Kenya's young cricketers who have undoubted talent to show their worth.

Below is the Cricket Kenya press release:

PRESS RELEASE - UNDER 17 TRIAL MATCHES

Cricket Kenya wishes to inform members of the press that we will be conducting trial matches for Under 17 players. This exercise is aimed at selecting a team to take part in the ICC/ACA Cup finals in Nairobi from 27^th to 30^th August 2009.

The trial games will take place at Ruaraka Sports Club on 13^th, 14^th and 15^th August and will involve players from Nairobi, Coast and Rift Valley provinces.

Important to note is the cut off date which is 1^st September 1991.

Kenya to play Zimbabwe away in October

Not sure how reliable this report is, but Kenya are apparently scheduled to take on Zimbabwe in the Intercontinental Cup in early October. Zimbabwe are fielding a less than full strength side in this event - a perfect cop out from a team that looks scared to play its full strength side in case they get beaten by an Associate and hence jeopardise the return to Test cricket. A ploy that the ICC in their ususal lame duck way when dealing with Full members over Associates have bowed to. Even so, it Should be a good opportunity for Kenya to get some more points away from home.

No concrete news yet from the ICC on the rest of the fixtures for this event. It is high time they got their act together and gave the Associates the time and warning needed to prepare for games properly. But then that would be running something efficiently, not really the forte of the game's administrators.

Go the Under 19s!

With most of the sports pages tomorrow (and for the next few days) devoted to Kenya's hunt for medals in Osaka, it is likely that another group of Kenyans will slip quietly under the radar as they try and qualify for their own World Championship.

I talk of course of the Kenyan Under 19 cricket team, who got their campaign off against Namibia today. I am posting results and write-ups on CricketEurope, so I won't repeat myself, but will send this thought: COME ON THE KENYA UNDER 19s!

Not for one moment am I saying forget our athletes - How good was it to see Luke Kibet cross the line to give Kenya the first Gold of the games by breaking such a long drought! While you are cheering them on however, spare a thought for our boys in Benoni. If they can win, it could usher in a whole new era for Kenyan cricket and how good would it be to have a Kenyan team sport on the rise again.