A fort night after the shaky performance in Vegas, the Kenya 7s will finally get a shot at salvation when they line up for the 5th round of the HSBC Sevens World series at the Westpac Stadium in Wellington, New Zealand.
The Westpac stadium holds some great memories for the side, having narrowly lost here last year to England in the cup final, that being only the second time the side has made it to a cup final in its history. Last year is however remembered for the win against the hosts at the Semi-finals.
Fast forward to this year where the side comes into the tournament off a Bowl final loss in Vegas and are currently in eighth spot with 39 points. After making a consistent run of three cup quarter final appearances, we slipped in Vegas where we narrowly missed making it 4 in 4, it will be time to get back into the cup competition in Wellington.
To qualify for the cup, we have to get through a tough Pool D which pits us against Samoa, Australia and Tonga. We will be one of the few sides that will keep the same 12 from the last outing meaning we benefit from continuity coming here.
In Samoa and Australia we have our biggest obstacle to a spot in the cup competition on paper, but as we saw in Vegas anything can happen. Samoa have been cup quarter finalists in three of the four tournaments only failing in Dubai, they were fourth place finishers in Vegas.
Australia, Plate finalists in Vegas have been to the cup twice before with Tonga only playing in their second tournament this season.
This time round we kick off with the tougher fixtures, starting off against Samoa then play Australia before rounding up the pool stage against Tonga. This means that we cannot afford a slow start here.
This will be the first meeting against Samoa this season. The Samoa side only changes one from Vegas with Niue having been suspended. The islanders have been in the last two cup semi-finals and we will need to be at our absolute best to get anything here.
Australia welcome fit again captain Ed Jenkins to the side and will be another tough one. It will be the second meeting this season having lost 24-12 in the first one. The Aussies seem to have adopted a new approach to the rucks, that seemed to work fine for them in Vegas, how we handle this area will be critical.
This will be the second meeting against Tonga this season, having beaten them 38-0 in Australia. We all know that The Tongans are not afraid to play ball and will be a tricky customer.
If we come into this game with one win from the first two you feel that we will have cup qualification in our sights. It looks like it will be a tight pool with the difference between the cup and the bowl being even tighter than in was in Vegas.
I will be looking for an improved performance here, the odds are that we won’t match last year’s run but if we hit the right chord early on, anything is possible.
An improvement at the turnover rate will be crucial, as it was revealed that we hold the lowest turnover rate in the series. This means that when the opponent has possession in most cases we let them keep it until they score or cause an infringement. Which has obviously seen us enjoy very little of the ball and there’s little you can do without it other than put extra pressure on the defence systems.
Most had raised concern over the selection in Vegas, having had 2 weeks with the twelve you expect a little more stable outfit, whichever seven the technical bench goes for will have what it takes to deliver. We’ll probably see Collo remain at sweeper with the duo of Tall and Oscar more involved, with more ball in hand this trio alongside Billy and Ayodi will be vital.
A spot in the cup quarter finals will be a welcome result for me here, anything more than that will be a bonus.
Friday 7th Feb 2013
Kenya vs Samoa – 3:42 am
Kenya vs Australia – 6:51 am
Kenya vs Tonga – 9:17 am
KWISHA….Nimeruka Nje!!!
