ACN: Relief for KHU as Team Kenya finally flies to Ghana

The Kenyan hockey fraternity has been saved of embarrassment after the national men’s and women’s teams belatedly flew out on Tuesday morning to Ghana for the Africa Nations Cup.

Kenya was staring at the possibility of skipping the quadrennial event thanks to the late approval and disbursement of money by the Sports Fund.

The Kenya Hockey Union (KHU)president Nashon Randiek earlier revealed that his office had requested Ksh 26 million for the tournament that kicked off on Monday at the Theodosia Okoh Stadium.

The union was forced to shelve their plan of sending the two teams to Ghana last Saturday as the Sports Fund board failed to meet last Friday to approve the budget. The board is understood to have met on Monday and released money to the union.

“The teams left on Tuesday morning to Ghana for the tournament,” disclosed Randiek. The departure of the two teams comes as a relief to the union that has been under sharp criticism for not kickstarting its leagues which stalled in March 2020.

The women’s team, Tausi were scheduled to take on Zambia on Monday morning in their opening match but the African Hockey Federation (AHF) came to their rescue after pushing the tie back to Wednesday. KHU wrote to the continental body pleading for the match to be pushed back owing to the late arrival to West Africa.

“We successfully appealed for the match to be rescheduled as we anticipated for a late departure to Ghana,” he said.

However, Jackline Mwangi’s girls may not have time to rest upon arrival as they are set to play the hosts in the afternoon with the men’s team scheduled to take on the redemption seeking Namibia late in the evening. Namibia lost 13-0 to defending champions South Africa on Monday.