I bet we all remember the video clip that surfaced few years back, of a man, let’s call him Sospeter, caught pants down with another man’s wife at a dingy motel somewhere in Central Kenya.
Poor Sospeter was pounded like the tumu tumu drums at harvest celebrations, all he had to say in his defence was..’Makosa imetendeka.’ This never deterred his punishers from serving him a probable beating of the century. I wonder what happened to Sospeter…
Ever since that incident, that phrase ‘makosa imetendeka’ has been used time and again, especially when one finds themselves in a tight corner. After watching the Kenya 7s at the Rio Olympics, I could not think of a better phrase to describe their performance.
For a team that left the country with so much expectation, with the hopes of not only a country but a continent, in Rio, Makosa ilitendeka!
I, and sure most, were dumb founded while trying to explain what we saw on our screens, it was like we had attended a brain format session in the period between the world sevens series and the Olympic Games.
If you were to show a total stranger videos from Rio and from the series and tell them that what they were watching was a side from barely 3 months apart, they’d probably smack you. So what happened to us?
There are tones of theories, like I am sure most of you have heard in your private mussings, we could build on those, selection, Nandi Bears (which by the way we trained at before our all successful 2015/16 season), coaches handing retirement packages to senior players, selfies (which is a silly story if you ask me)…blah blah blah.
What was clear though was, we were not adequately prepared for what hit us at Rio. So is it because we did not train? We did train, though not as we had hoped to, seeing as we did not have the S&C coach nor a gym in Nandi. But we did train, here is my theory.
It looked like we put in the same effort we have been putting ever since we won in Singapore, while the rest of the field were putting in 4 or 5 times the work, they were during the series, getting ready for the Olympics. By effort here I do not mean weights and work loads in the gym or number of sprints, rather a work plan.
It was not us, it was them. It is not that the Kenya sevens became worse, it is just that the others became way better. The same could be said for the All Blacks sevens, who by the way, if you think you Kenyan lot are harsh, you should see what the All balck 7s have been through. I should also put in Japan here, as testament to the theory above.
So what next? We could sit here, sulk, over spilt beer, probably knocked over by a hopeless drunk. Or we could stand up, ignore the drunk and walk to the counter to grab another cold one.
We should look to keep this party going, makosa ilitendeka, let’s get back home restructure and get back to being the world beaters we are! In the meantime, Makosa aki ilitendeka, pia kuna ingine ilitendeka mahali IG but did you..
KWISHA…Nimeruka Nje!!!
