Germany stands between Kenya and World Rugby Sevens Series
Kenya’s John Okoth cuts through the Spain defense on day one of the HSBC SVNS Grand Final at Stadium Civitas Metropolitano on 31 May 31, 2024 in Madrid, Spain.
Germany stands between Kenya Sevens and their dream to return to the 2024/2025 World Rugby Sevens Series.
Kenya Sevens landed the quarter-final clash against the Germans when they finished second with seven points in Pool “B” of the World Rugby Seven promotion and relegation play-offs in Madrid, Spain yesterday.
Shujaa completed their pool outing strongly when they landed six tries to thrash Chile 36-7 top finish with two wins and a loss.
Hosts Spain topped with nine points after they completed their campaign with a clean sheet, beating Samoa 31-0.
Kenya, who led Chile 17-7 at the break, started their campaign strongly on Friday, beating Samoa 19-12 before going down 10-5 to hosts Spain.
Kenya will be going out for revenge against the Germans at 6.20pm today in one of the quarter-finals where all the four winners will earn promotion to the World Rugby Sevens Series.
Germany finished third in Pool “A” after they lost to Uruguay 26-14 in their last match. That saw Uruguay finish second with six points as USA won the pool undefeated with nine points, beating Canada 14-7 in the final pool match.
USA face Samoa at 5.56pm while Uruguay take on Chile at 6.44pm in the battle of the South Americans. Spain will meet Canada at 7.08pm.
John Okoth landed a brace of tries as Chrisant Ojwang, Samuel Asati, Vincent Onyala and George Ooro scored a try each. Nygel Amaitsa managed two conversions while Anthony Mboya managed one.
“We will take time to analyze Germany and come up with a winning plan keeping in mind that they lost to them in the challenger series,” said Okoth.” Winning will be a great motivation to us since we have worked hard in training at home.”
Kenya lost to Germany 19-17 in the quarter-final of the third and final leg of the World Rugby Challenger Series in Munchi, Germany.
Kenya Sevens were relegated from the World Rugby Sevens Series for the first time in 23 years last season to drop to the newly introduced World Rugby Challenger Series that now provides the promotion pathway to the World Series.
Meanwhile, champion Kabras Sugar and KCB will face off for the third consecutive face-off in the Enterprise Cup.
Kabras Sugar, who are eying their fourth consecutive cup success, dismantled visiting Nondescripts 54-32 in an explosive semi-final played at the Kakamega Showground while the bankers stopped Kenya Harlequin18-8 at the KCB Ruaraka Sports Club.
Kabras crushed Impala Saracens 37-7 in the final to win their maiden Enterprise Cup title in 2019 at the RFUEA ground but the event was not played in 2020 and 2021 due to Covid-19.
They then beat KCB 9-6 to complete a double in 2022 moments after claiming their second Kenya Cup before they made it a hat-trick last year, downing the bankers again 30-27 at the RFUEA.
