Orange crown rich Kenyan outing in Africa hockey cup

The Hockey Africa Cup of Club Championship came to a close on Sunday at the Nairobi City Park with Telkom Orange bagging the women’s title for the fifth consecutive and a record nine times.

Kenyan teams pressed their home ground advantage, reaping big from the tournament with Sliders who were making their debut in the women’s competition emerging as the only local side to be eliminated from the group stage.

Orange pulverised familiar foes Heartland in the semi-final in a match which rekindled their old rivalry and despite the Nigerians coming into the match keen to avenge their 3-1 loss back in 2014 when they last met in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe the Kenyans romped to the decider with a 7-0 hammering.

At the final, they were forced to up their game when they faced a resilient Ghana Revenue Authority who had the dangerous flying striker and the tournament’s joint top scorer with seven goals, Elizabeth Opoku, in their ranks.

Her fine form in front of goal made her a menace to opposition defenders but Orange came in with a plan to shackle the Ghanaian star player.

Their tactics bore fruit enabling them to not only nullify her threat but to also emerge victorious with a 2-0 score line.

Goals in both halves from Jacquiline Wangechi and Nekesa Juma were enough to guarantee them their fifth successive trophy to the delight of Orange Head Coach Jos Openda.

“First I want to thank God, my assistants, the team manager and our sponsors who have supported us financially all through. It feels good to win this title and more so for doing it convincingly.

“We discussed the strategies which one of them included nullifying the threat of Opoku who was their star player. We had studied her game especially the way she does so many tricks when with the ball,” the elated Orange boss said.

Eastern Company of Egypt scrapped through local favourites Kenya Police to hold on to the men’s title they won last year although their stalemate in normal time meant that they had to proceed to penalty flicks.

Mahmoud Aboutaleb, Ahmed Amir and Ibrahim Amr netted their flicks with only Ahmed Elnaggar Ahmed missing the target while the Kenyan law enforcers scored only two after Calvins Kanu and Robert Masibo failed to convert their strokes.

Police captain Brian Saina rued their loss to Eastern in their maiden final; bemoaning the chances they wasted to deny them a chance to complete the Kenyan double.

“We are very disappointed to lose the final. We had a few chances to win ourselves but we did not take them. The loss on penalties is tough but being in the final is already a big step for us,” he eyed the silver lining.

On the other side, it was a joy for Eastern Company who had seen their aim of retaining the title come to fruition.

“We are happy to have won this title again. It was a tough match and I give credit to them for pushing us the way they did. Our only goal was to retain the title and that has come to be,” Eastern defender Mohammed Ramy said.

Earlier on, Butali Sugar Warriors defeated a hapless Ghana Police 3-0 in the men third place playoffs to be awarded the bronze medal.

Joost Ruksen opened the scoring in the fifth minute, Frank Wanangwe scored the second on the 20th while Vincent Odhiambo capped off an excellent performance by netting the third in the 54th.

Butali’s import Hattum Jannis was again in fine form, calmly dictating proceedings from the central midfield and after the match highlighted his joy for getting a chance to play for the Kisumu based side terming it as the best experience in his hockey career so far.

“It was an honour to play for Butali in this competition. I loved the whole experience and hopefully I will be able to play for them again,” said the 21 year- old who hails from Netherlands gushed.

In the women’s third place playoff Nigeria’s Kada Queens beat Heartland 4-2.

-Report by Mwangi Githinji