The good, bad and ugly of Kenya Cup final
It took grit and resilience for KCB Rugby Club to complete their fourth successive Kenya Cup title on Saturday at Nandi Bears Sports Club.
They accomplished the feat in perhaps what was one of the most exciting comebacks in the league's history on the backdrop of poor organisation that almost had the final called off.
Skipper and fullback Darwin Mukidza come of the sin-bin to curl in a sudden death penalty and spur KCB to their eighth Kenya Cup success success with a 28-27 win against Kabras Sugar Rugby Club.
Kabras Sugar, the 2015/2016 champions, led 20-0 at the break and 25-11 into the last nine minutes.
The match was stopped three minutes to halftime for one hour and 30 minutes as the organisers waited for ambulances to evacuate two injured KCB players, Isaac Njoroge and Rocky Anguko to hospital.
Echoing one of legendary writer Chinua Achebe's famous quotes, KCB Rugby deputy coach Dennis "Ironman" Mwanja compared Kabras Sugar to the 'antelope that danced herself lame when the main dance was yet to come'.
"The stoppages messed up everyone. We are not happy when such a high profile match is played under such awful conditions...it's simply unacceptable," said Mwanja.
"It took resilience and lionhearted considering that we had three players sin-binned, one in the first half and two in the last session."
KCB head coach Curtis Olago, who is a man of few words, said: "It took grit and character. We had faith in all the circumstances and had to change tactics when it rained."
Olago said going for a fifth consecutive title next season won't be easy.
"Serious planning starts in earnest, " said Olago, who is also the Kenya Under-21 coach.
Mukidza described it as the greatest feeling ever as his Kabras counterpart Dan Sikuta regretted the long break and missed opportunities.
"This is the best game I have ever had in my career," said an emotional Mukidza, adding that they started slow in the first half by giving their opponents a leeway in their territory.
Mukidza said he has never been under so much pressure as he took the winning penalty.
"The posts looked far than usual yet they were less than 30m away," said Mukidza.
"I just focused on the fundamentals of kicking and that was it."
Mukidza said the organisers should have done better to provide basics.
"The break ruined our momentum. We were on an upward trajectory," said Sikuta, explaining that KCB cashed on the break and their experience to rally back strong to win.
"We lost concentration especially on the last 10 minutes to allow them to comeback. They knew what the break meant and tough luck for us and well-done KCB," said Sikuta.
Despite what he termed a big mistake regarding player safety at the final, KRU chairman Oduor Gangla said it was generally a good final, but a tough season orchestrated by the Covid-19 lockdown.
"It proved tough to clubs to restart with no sponsors on board as some players quit the game," said Gangla.
"Overall, playing 11 games in seven months proved rusty but we are happy the league is back," said Gangla.
Gangla said they used over Sh5 million on Covid-19 testing, money that should have been used in the development of the game.
Gangla said the biggest challenge is lack of spectators and the only way out is mass vaccination. "We need the lower leagues too to start running," said Gangla.
Kabras were ruthless in the first half with their forwards muscling their way through, setting the platform for their fullbacks to sneak in two tries from the right blind side.
Fly-half Dukisa Ntabeni, who was named man-of- the match and highest top points scorer with 119, converted the tries just after he had given Kabras two penalties.
It's a half that KCB's failed in their lineouts.
In the second half, Jacob Ojee gave KCB their first try and was followed by Mukidza's penalty, but their comeback was jolted when Andrew Amonde was sin-binned.
Valerian Tendwa would score a try from the resulting penalty to stretch Kabras' lead to 25-8.
Mukidza curled over another penalty to bring KCB back to 25- 11 only to be sin-binned. KCB further improved as Amonde returned and scored to bring the score to 25-18.
Vincent Onyalo scored at the death with the returning Mukidza converting to tie the match at 25-25 as Kubu was sin-binned. BY DAILY NATION
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