Kenya Simbas will demolish Senegal at RFUEA

What you need to know:

  • Seje will be looking to solidify his claim on the number 12 jersey as he turns out for his fourth Test in Saturday’s game against the West Africans.

The French have a saying On change pas l’quipe qui gagne! Which loosely translates to “never change a winning combination.” It seems that Kenya Simbas’ head coach Jerome Paartwater is a believer of this school of thought.

On Thursday, he announced a largely unchanged squad that sees Simon Muniafu reclaim his starting berth in second row in place of George Nyambua. This meant that Steve Security Otieno had to pave the way for the dropped Nyambua on the bench.

The mood in the Simbas’ camp must be buoyant and electric. You can’t blame the boys for being upbeat and optimistic. They had come under a barrage of criticism in their timid performance against Germany and Uganda. Some pessimistic pundits had started writing obituaries of Kenya XV regarding a failed World Cup dream. Their 100-10 thrashing of Tunisia restored the team’s self-belief, and our confidence in the squad.

Tomorrow’s (today’s) game against Senegal will kick off at 2.00pm, strange timing for a Test match in Nairobi. The unfamiliar timing for the kick-off has been necessitated by the broadcaster Kwesse Sports who have two scheduled matches. Uganda will be taking on Tunisia at 4.30pm in Kampala.

Last week, I wrote about how the decision to start Leo Seje ahead of Patrice Agunda is key to restoring Kenya’s famed and feared backline attack. The Maseno School alumnus proved me right! Seje was all over the park with big tackles, contesting and winning restarts, and offering beautiful support play. He capped off his man-of-the-match performance with a try after being set up by hardworking Jacob Ojee.

Seje will be looking to solidify his claim on the number 12 jersey as he turns out for his fourth Test in Saturday’s game against the West Africans. The only other centres who can effectively challenge him for the positions are Mwamba RFC’s Brad Owako or Homeboyz RFC’s Max Kang’eri.

Kenya Harlequins’ Agunda has been influential for both club and country for almost a decade but it’s time he gave up the national team jersey to a younger and hungrier midfielder.

Another player that had been under microscopic attention was Impala Saracens’ Eric Kerre. The lock turned flanker has put in under wheliming performances in previous Test matches, prompting questions as to why Paarwater has kept on naming him to the squad.

I believe that he put in a good effort Saturday afternoon against Tunisia, doing all the right things expected of a blindside flanker. He capped his performance with two tries. Not bad for someone just growing into a new role.

Against Senegal, Kenya will be expected to play a high tempo match and avoid unnecessary contact. The Senegalese will try to slow down the game by throwing bodies at the breakdown, a tactic that they tried using against Namibia and Zimbabwe. The two teams simply upped the tempo of the game and the Lions of Teranga were burnt out.

Simbas should be wary of the negative and disruptive game that Senegal loves playing. They will do all manner of illegal stuff in the scrum, breakdowns and the tackle just to provoke the opponents and invite them for a dogfight, their speciality!

Tunisians, too, love this type of play but the cool Kenyan heads deflected any invitation of confrontation last Saturday. It will be to Kenya’s advantage if the technical bench had a word with Thomas Charabas, the French referee, on this negative tactics by Senegalese.

Generally, I expect a dominant display by the home both in set pieces and open play and they should be comfortable winners at the end of the day. My prediction is +50 win by Simbas.