Launch of under-13 tourney a step in the right direction

What you need to know:

  • The on-going under-13 league organised by Football Kenya Federation (FKF) is a brilliant idea. It is purposeful, well timed and deliberate enough to make us wish to smile.
  • It gives us some hope that we may make future players just like some other countries do.
  • So far we have depended on players that have built themselves or have been built by others or even those that accidentally found out that they can play football!

The on-going under-13 league organised by Football Kenya Federation (FKF) is a brilliant idea. It is purposeful, well timed and deliberate enough to make us wish to smile.

It gives us some hope that we may make future players just like some other countries do.

So far we have depended on players that have built themselves or have been built by others or even those that accidentally found out that they can play football!

We have been reaping where we do not sow. at the same time we just cannot count the talent we have lost without youth structures being put in place.

There are many kids out there who may have been heroes on the pitch but find themselves in prison for other reasons that have nothing to do with their undiscovered talents.

The timing of the tournament is April when schools are closed and we have a chance to let the kids explore other avenues in life rather than stick to academics.

When we have 1,347 youth clubs registered to play in the tournament we of course are talking about 17,000 children who are taking part in the league!

That number itself gives us some hope that we cannot fail to discover talent in there. The initiative has sent us scurrying in many counties to see what is really happening on the ground and we must say we like it.

This is an event of its own kind and if we put in some “staying power” and make it even larger and more formidable we shall be planting seeds of tomorrow that shall feed football in this country.

The tournament started with inter-sub branches of FKF which took place two weekends back. The inter-branches took place over the weekend and we are expecting the inter regions to be held on April 22 and 23.

From there, a team will be selected to go to Southampton in December to take part in a u-13 championship.

Of course the same tournament will act as the registration centre for the growing footballers of the future. Each will be given an FKF card with unique license number that shall help identify each club the youth will have played for until he is a full-fledged footballer.

It will also help to curb the incidents of age cheating that have plagued this country in the u-17 and u-20 teams. There are times when we have “erroneously” entered youth with full set of teeth to masquerade as youngsters.

This has really hurt and caused Kenya to be suspended for stretches of time from taking part in such tournaments. It was a very shameful affair and we hope all the children that are taking part in the u-13 tournament are really within the age limit!

We saw several tight cheekbones and fully developed muscles in some teams but we hope all of them have real birth certificates. Remember, on the FKF registration form we have the caveat which stresses that: “all players must produce a birth certificate in order to be registered”.

There could be some cunning fellows who may get fake ones and deny a chance to those who truly are under 13 years of age.

For many years whenever older people talk about youth football development, they usually go back to the German coach Benard Zgoll who started something of the sort in all big towns in this country.

That was way back in the seventies. It is annoying that even today we still talk about the same man having failed to emulate his policy over all the years gone by. Indeed, Bob Munro too did the same with Mathare United not a long time ago and the only problem is that he is still alive and praising him becomes very hard since it hurts the emotions of the powers that be.