African Women's Volleyball Club Championships - Can Kenyan clubs pull it off?

From 10th-19th of May, Nairobi shall play host to the 2012 African Women's Volleyball Club championships to be held at the MISC- Kasarani Gym (if renovation works at the centre finally permit...), with 2 other venues on stand-by in case of any changes. These are African Nazarene indoor volleyball court as well as Brookfield Schools' court.

Once again Kenyan women volleyballers will have the chance to show the continent, why they are the leading proponents in the club game. This would be sweet solace after missing out on Olympic qualifications for the second time after losing out to the Algerians early this year.

Kenya will be represented by 3 clubs including 2-time reigning champions Kenya Prisons, regular finalists and past winners Kenya Pipeline as well as KCB. On paper the Kenyan clubs start as favourites not just because of their regular appearances in the finals but also because of the home court advantage.
They would also love to serve notice as to why they are still among the best in the continent. Each of these clubs have been in residential training and have recruited heavily from high schools and higher learning institutions to ensure continuity and fresh talent.

The only undoing has been lack of a proper professional league in the country unlike some of the North Africans such as Algeria and Egypt. The clubs from these two countries enjoy massive corporate support as well as professionalised services in their recruitment, training and exposure too.
The gap between the North Africans and also the West Africans is slowly closing and it better serve notice to the Kenya Volleyball Federation to raise the standards of the game locally too.
Last week, the Kenyan men's club representatives Kenya Prisons were bundled out of the Men's Africa Club championships in the semi-finals. It has been a tough time for the male players who haven't been able to match their female counterparts both at club and national level.

All in all, join us as we savour the continental game starting next Wednesday at the Kasarani gym. Wonder if any of the Kenyan media houses will choose to screen the games live...what say SuperSport with their SuperSport 9-EA?

Volleyball...can the Girls be true Queens now?

The continental volleyball scene is slowly becoming Kenya's mainstay. The club level shows this as the case but let's not be too happy for the time being. We have seen this before, our girls doing well on the continental platform but being dismal at the international engagements. As continental champs, the Confederation Africaine de Volleyball, CAVB needs to get its work cut out and send the team(s) for the necessary training camps of course with the national volleyball body working in close ties with them.
It would be fair for the continent to come out and put a better performance in the Women's World Club Championships to be held in Qatar later this year. 5th out of 6 team is not a respectable position and though ambitious 3rd place is a possibility.
Let's work towards that please Kenya Volleyball Federation and make the best for the continent as we have done in other sports. Well played though for Kenya Prisons winning the African club championships & Kenya Pipeline mustering a 2nd place too !

Volleyball : Kenyan Queens do it again

This year's Women’s African club championship held in Mauritius saw our three teams qualify for the semi-finals, with Kenya Prisons winning the title, 3-1 sets against Kenya Pipeline. This is something of a perennial thing for Kenyan women clubs and this has made them contribute to national and continental success.

The only tragedy is that we have not been able to translate this to the international scene with our team losing mercilessly in the World Championships and Olympics respectively. Methinks the new Kenya Volleyball Federation has its work cut out. With the Commonwealth Games, Olympics and world championships coming up in the next 2 years, better start working now. I do hope you've resolved your little tiff with the Sports Stadia Management Board to avail to you the Kasarani Gym (which the Federation ought to pay for though the Government can throw in a subsidy or two).

Volleyball: Gloves come off

After playing their qualifying matches and moving to the quarters, Kenyan teams , Kenya Prisons and Kenya Pipeline have been disqualified from the tournament-African Womens Club Championships.
For what has been a low key event and an even worse PR job from the organisers, this will effectively mean no Kenyan team plays for the remainder of the tournament. The disqualification came after other teams from Tunisia and Cameroon raised concerns that the 2 teams had fielded players who had played in foreign leagues in the last 6 months thus forfeiting their positions in the current clubs.
Now for the lure of Arab oil monies, the teams have been banned for 2 years and the players for one year...heavy penalties if you ask me...almost like death knells for them.
Kenya Volleyball Federation(KVF) can't escape the blame since they ought to have alerted the teams of dangers of fielding these players some of who are not even at their best. They ought to have saved the country the embarrassment of having both teams banned and in effect no representation to the country. It tells you why they never secured enough sponsors or are endeared to local firms.
Barbs and more barbs on you KVF !!!

Volleyball : Who's the 'Man'?

Finally the curtains are drawn on the Kenya Volleyball 2007 season. The year's been a mixed bag of fortunes. Starting with the wo-men, the individual clubs put up a very good show with top seeds KCB and Kenya Pipeline being dethroned from African club championship by Kenya Prisons.
KCB managed to win the play-offs thus qualifying automatically for the club championships. Kenya Pipeline and Prisons play for the 2nd slot.
The major misfiring was loss to the North Africans to represent Africa in the Olympics. Our ladies did give it a good shot but this was not their time. This exposed some of the weaknesses and technical aspects which will need to be worked on by next qualifiers.
All good so far.
When we turn into the men's game, it is another ball game altogether. Our men have become whipping kids for major countries which seems like some serious imbalance to me. What expertise do the wo-men who ironically are coached by men - from Paul Bitok to Gerald Lung'aho, Sylvester Kioko...all MEN ? That more fans flock the wo-men games than the men is a bitter truth that our men have to deal with.
That's some dilemma right there for Kenya Volleyball Federation. Who's the man ?