The men’s national football team, Harambee Stars, played to a barren draw against Zimbabwe in their opening group J match of the 2025 AFCON qualification tournament on Friday evening.
The two teams started the game slow, with Harambee Stars failing to have a shot on target in the first 20 minutes of the match played at the Mandela National Stadium in Kampala, Uganda due to the lack of a CAF-approved stadium in the country.
After just 21 minutes, Harambee Stars head coach Engin Firat was forced into making a substitution, bringing in Amos Nondi in place of Gor Mahia’s new signing Alphonce Omija who picked up an injury.
Despite the introduction of Nondi, Kenya continued to play without any hunger for goals as the first half ended with the deadlock intact.
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Shortly after the start of the second half, Scottish-based midfielder Richard Odada picked up a yellow card for a dangerous tackle.
As the match went on, Harambee Stars began to take control. However, they did very little to hurt the Zimbabwean backline.
The lack of enough firepower in the team’s attack made Firat make a tactical change to try to pick something from the game.
He replaced Eric Johana Omondi with experienced striker John Avire in the 68th minute but the substitution failed to bear any fruit.
Harambee Stars
Fourteen minutes later, Zimbabwean tactician Michael Nees also made a similar change. He introduced Douglas Mapfumo in place of Prince Mpumelelo Dube, an effective move, since the Warriors started to play with direction.
Sensing danger, his Kenyan counterpart made two changes with less than five minutes remaining to the end of the clash to prevent the visitors from scoring any goal.
He replaced Duke Abuya and Eric Ouma with Alwyn Tera and Abud Omar respectively, a move that ensured the game ended goalless.
Kenya currently sit at the top of Group J with a single point ahead of Saturday’s encounter between Cameroon and Namibia.
Harambee Stars’ focus now shifts to the second group match against Namibia scheduled to be played on Tuesday, September 10 in South Africa.
A win for Harambee Stars will put them in a good position of qualifying for next year’s AFCON tournament, which will be staged in Morocco since only the top two team nations will qualify.
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Tujiamini is an initiative that seeks to provide a platform, including up to 30M shillings in funding, for individual, team sports and various talent, in a year-long campaign that will go around the country in a move aimed at evoking the sense of pride in Kenya’s sports and talent ecosystem.
Applicants are urged to submit their applications through www.tujiamini.co.ke