Action in the Chairman’s Cup enters it’s penultimate stage this weekend with 4 sets of semi finals lined up.
Main Cup
In the Main Cup, KCB will face Strathmore at the Lion’s den, the green shirts come into this fixture off a hard fought 7-3 win over Nakuru at the NAC. That win will be a great morale booster for the lions who before this match had failed to register a win at the ‘Suguta Valley’ in the last three attempts.
They welcome a Leos side that beat Mwamba 28-10 to book this place, Strathmore have had a steady campaign this far having beaten TUK 55-7 on Match day 2. With the senior players held up in Super Series action this match will probably be a replay of the Mwamba Cup quarter final where KCB II were 32-13 victors.
The other semi final will see Homeboyz meet Machine at the UoN, these two have probably been the high flyers in this tournament. They have taken full advantage of their minimal involvement in the Super Series to put in a great showing this far.
Machine beat Quins 29-15 in the highlight of match day three to book their spot in the semi final at the expense of the quartered shirts. Homeboyz on their part beat Impala 20-10 to ensure their passage here. This should be a closely fought encounter judging from previous meetings with both sides employing a similar style of play.
KCB vs Strathmore
Machine vs Homeboyz
Plate
The Plate category serves up some mouth watering encounters that have served us with great matches over the history of Kenya Rugby.
First up will be Blakblad taking on Mwamba at the Blad bin, this one has always been a cracker, this time should be no different. Mwamba missed out on a cup spot after falling to Strathmore, before that they had blanked Catholic University 41-13.
Blad on the other hand started off with a loss to KCB before impressively seeing off Nakuru 20-12 in their last fixture having gotten a walk over against Daystar on Game day 2.
These two will be out to get to the final in an effort to salvage what has been a respectable run in this tournament.
The second semi final will be the good old Ngong road derby, pitting Nyumbu sides Quins and Impala. This match needs no introduction or even a preview, whenever these two meet there’s bound to be fireworks.
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| Quins take on Impala in a league match in the 2011/12 season |
Quins have had the upper hand in this duel over the recent past, though with the bulk of their players in the Nyumbu side that dominance looks to be challenged. They have already fallen to Machine having struggled to beat perennial rivals Nondies in the previous round.
Impala on their part don’t look any stronger but might have an edge over Quins seeing as they have the services of most of their senior players for this one. Impala’s highlight result was the 51-7 drubbing of JKUAT, that was before losing to the Djs as mentioned earlier.
Blak Blad vs Mwamba
Quins vs Impala
Bowl & Shield
In any tournament, the Bowl and Shield categories always claim their fair share of ‘big teams’ who many would not have predicted their participation here. The Chairman’s Cup is no different with Nakuru and Nondies being this year’s casualties.
Nakuru can point to the fact that all their senior players are involved in the Ndovu franchise in defence of their poor performance which can be excused. For Nondies though, it has just been a bad tournament.
Nakuru after falling to Blak Blad and KCB now face TUK in the first Bowl Semi final with Nondies taking on JKUAT in the other Semi final. I don’t think the two ‘big’ sides will take anything less than a Bowl final, they should be careful though going into these encounters, you know what they say…”Baulo ina wenyewe..”
Bowl
Nakuru vs TUK
Nondies vs JKUAT
The Shield Category will see Daystar taking on Catholic University in a replay of this season’s university league in which Catholic emerged victorious.
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| Daystar take on Catholic in a previous encounter. |
Kemu Nairobi will be taking on Multimedia in the second semi final. These four sides are without a win after three rounds of matches and will be looking to claim their first victories that will guarantee passage into the Final.
Shield
Daystar vs Catholic University
KEMU Nairobi vs Multimedia
Schools
Action in the Schools has heated up with the Prescott, Damu Pevu and Changa season under way. The Nairobi County sevens also took place last weekend, which culminated in Strathmore edging The Nairobi School 19-15 in the Cup Final. The likes of Lenana, St. Mary’s and Upper Hill were brushed away by sides like New Dawn, Muhuru Muchiri and Eutychus..yes that last one is a school.
The Prescott Cup offered some interesting results with the highlight being The Nairobi School’s 32-7 defeat at the hands of Kiambu in Pool B, with Alliance recording an almost similar score of 31-7 against rivals Mangu. People have drawn all manner of conclusions from these results, understandably those who have never experienced the school’s most prestigious Cup, it is still too early in the day, Tharaka nithi bado, hehe.
It is good to see the likes of Kiambu come of age and beat the gods of Kenya School’s rugby, a few years back a match between these two would have ended in a cricket score to the Patch Machine, goes to show how far schools’ rugby has come.
This weekend will see schools action move to the St. Mary’s fields for the 30th edition of the BlackRock tournament, this year’s edition has attracted a total of 36 sides, 24 boys schools and 12 girl schools. Defending Cup and Plate champions, The Nairobi School will have their work cut out for them if they are to retain that title as they will come up against the likes of National Champions Kakamega High School, St. Mary’s Yala, Mangu and yes, Kiambu.
With that Ladies and Gents, Boys and Girls do enjoy your rugby packed weekend let’s meet here on Monday and compare notes aaaaaaaannnnnnnndddddddd……
KWISHA…Nimeruka Nje!!!!
