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Kenya/Mauritania: Soccer - When Mauritania's Lapses Aided Stars' Qualification
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The Nation (Nairobi)
COLUMN
26 April 2008
Posted to the web 25 April 2008
Hezekiah Wepukhulu
The African Nations Cup qualifying match between Kenya's Harambee Stars and Mauritania at the Moi International Sports Centre, Kasarani, was nearly called off at the last minute five years ago because of the late arrival of the north African side.
As if that was not bad enough, the Mauritanians, who flew into Nairobi on the very day of the match, were held up at the airport for about one hour because of a visa hitch.
Desperate to secure entry, the visitors appealed to the Kenya Football Federation to bail them out, but the request was, nevertheless, turned down.
Instead, the Kenya national soccer governing body referred them to the immigration department and asked the department to step in and help.
They obliged by agreeing to allow the visitors entry.
Mauritania caused another delay when they left their hotel rooms late to arrive at the stadium at kick off time, 2 pm, where they found both Harambee Stars players and spectators waiting with bated breath.
Their team manager asked for the game to be rescheduled for the following day, Sunday, but the match commissioner turned the request down on grounds that it was already too late.
Eventually, the belated proceedings kicked off two hour late. Some of the Mauritanian players had not changed into their uniforms and were even seen changing as they left their dressing room.
By the time they entered the ground, most of them looked too tired from the jet lag and their performance on the field suffered.
As a result, the team proved to be no match for the home boys who crushed them 4-0.
The return match, held in Mauritania two weeks later ended in a scoreless draw. The Kenyans strode into the next round on a 4-0 aggregate.
The following month, Kenya followed this up by seeing off Togo on a 3-2 aggregate victory to advance.
The Harambee Stars outplayed Togo 3-0 at home but the Togolese turned the tables on them with their 2-0 home win. But that was not enough to wipe out the three-goal deficit.
It was a good year for the Harambee Stars as in their last qualifying round match against Cape Verde, they eliminated them on a 2-0 aggregate to qualify for the Nations Cup finals in Tunisia.
But in Tunisia, the Harambee Stars failed to impress and fell by the wayside, managing to win only one of their matches - 3-0 against Burkina Faso - to recover some of their lost pride.
Kenyan clubs have been often accused of playing a non-registered player using someone else's card. But a Ugandan Super League team, Military FC, found themselves in deep trouble six years ago for claiming that one of their key players had died so as to get their scheduled match postponed after they failed to travel to western Uganda for a league match against Kasese.
They requested for a postponement saying that they could not honour the fixture because player, Sammy Ofua, had suddenly died after a short illness.
Smelling a rat, league officials asked the club to produce a death certificate to confirm the player's demise.
Of course, they were suspicious that the club had invented Ofua's death as they could not afford to go to the game.
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The lying officials concerned were caught with their pants down as they had not anticipated such a reaction from the organisers.
According to BBC Sports, the Uganda Super League officials were quoted saying a postponement could only be possible if the death certificate was produced.
The military team failed to present the death certificate and forfeited the match. They realised their blunder and decided not to pursue the matter further.
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