Nairobi — Kenya's Under-20 national team coach Anthony Akhulia feels the team was capable of doing better after their group stage elimination from the U20 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) in Cairo, Egypt.
The Rising Stars made their debut at the tournament in Cairo, but ended up losing two of their group matches against Morocco (3-2) and Tunisia (3-1) before picking a hard earned 2-2 draw against Nigeria. Both Morocco and Nigeria ended up reaching the semis and qualifying for the World Cup.
Speaking exclusively to Telecomasia.net, Akhulia says they let the country down and believes they could have done way better.
"I feel like we let Kenyans down. There were a lot of expectations and belief in us because we had a really good team and we had the ability to do better. But it is a learning process. We played against really tough teams all who have won the tournament before and in all those three games, we were not outplayed in any. We only gave away goals from our own mistakes defensively," Akhulia told Telecomasia.
He believes that the players and the coaches as well have picked massive experience from the campaign, and competing for the first time ever was a win in itself. Akhulia tells Telecomasia.net that he believes they now have renewed hunger and desire to qualify consistently for the tournament.
