Its 2 am on the 8th of February 2014, the Kenya sevens have had a tough run so far losing to Australia and Samoa in the Pool matches and are due to run out in a little over an hour in the bowl quarter finals against Portugal at the Westpac Stadium in Wellington.
This will be the second time this season that the side will be playing in the bowl competition in as many tournaments. The Shujaa were losing Bowl finalists in the previous leg in Las Vegas. As you would expect the Kenya sevens fan is not pleased with the recent form of the side, a good number of the masses are already calling for the coach’s head.
Let me take you back a few months back when the side was handed to the second most successful coach in sevens history, Paul Treu. The South African tactician was picked by the KRU to replace Mike Friday who had been with the side for almost a year, during that period, the side managed to hit the heights it had in the all-conquering 2008/09 season.
During his grand unveiling ceremony, Treu set the modest goal of finishing 10th in his first season. Most had seen this as a very conservative target for the sevens guru, what with the success the side had enjoyed in the past season coupled with his pedigree.
Treu’s mandate was set out from the get go, along with his technical bench he was to oversee the development of the sevens game in the country and ensure that the side not only qualify for the Olympic games in 2016 but also challenge for podium finish.
He was coming in after the side had already played in the first leg of the 2013/14 season at the Gold coast in Australia under Felix ‘Totti’ Ochieng. In that leg the side were runners up in the Plate category losing 0-36 to Fiji in the final.
There was no time for pleasantries as the new technical bench got to work just ahead of the second and third legs in Dubai and Port Elizabeth. In those two legs the side bowed out at the Plate Semi finals.
Through the four legs he has overseen this far the side has evidently looked out of sorts, and disjointed, a far cry from what we got accustomed to last year. The last two legs in Vegas and Wellington seem to be the worst so far and have seen the average fan up in arms.
The common theme of this uproar has been the recall of former head coach Mike Friday, comparisons have been drawn between the two and conclusions already drawn up that the English man is the better option.
First, comparisons between the two tacticians and their respective tenures is way off the mark. Like any two human beings, the two cannot be the same, they both have different approaches to the sport, and their interactions with the side have been in very different circumstances. The only similarity is that the two are great tacticians of the sport.
Friday came in August 2012, a good three months before the start of the series. He found a team that had been through it’s worst season in recent times. He picked his players well in advance and had the benefit of a proper pre season, the same cant be said about Treu.
The English man took a more conservative approach, didn’t change much he instilled the basics of the game, bulked them up and made the most of what worked. He seemed to look at the short term first, he stuck to a certain pool of players of 12 changing very rarely. In many ways he could be termed as one dimensional in his ways.
There is no telling what the long term had under him, we would have definitely hit the ceiling and plateaued sooner or later, whether side would have improved any further is anyone’s guess.
So far Treu looks to have new approach that is not in line with Friday’s both on and off the field. Thus he had to ‘format’ the team’s style. He seems to adopt a more bold approach, not afraid to take a risk and favouring the long term and setting the foundation for future success.
He is like a man that has inherited a building that is already some way built, and sees that the design won’t work, has to bring it down and start from scratch. The South African has so far given more debuts in 4 legs than Friday did in a year. He will do what we are not used to, like bench Tall or Oscar or travel without any of our sweepers, to try to get us to next level.
So it is time for me and you to decide, whether we’d rather stick to what we have been doing for the past 10 years and get the same results over and over, or pick a new approach and trust somebody who has been there done that and wrote a book (hope he does) to take us to the next level?
We have fallen off the pace, there’s no hiding that, we are not competing like we would want to. The technical bench and players have admitted this and that there is a need to manage short term performance and long term goals. Once that balance is met we will be good. Let the man find his footing, his combinations then sit back and watch him lead us to world domination.
In Kenya rugby circles we have a phrase ‘Weh decide’ which is mostly used when replying to not so smart questions. It loosely translates to ‘make a decision on your own’. So my message to you as a Kenya sevens fan is, “Weh decide.”
There’s no telling how long this transition will take, this largely depends on the receptiveness of our players to the new systems. I do however hope like most, that we have seen the worst that this period has to offer.
Meanwhile……
KWISHA..Nimeruka Nje!!!
