No looking back for Wafalme Stars after African Games silver
Wafalme Stars players celebrate a point during their African Games Zone Five qualifier against Burundi in Cairo, Egypt on January 27, 2024.
What you need to know:
- Reaching the final with a squad of local-based players speaks volumes of the strength of our local league
- The technical bench should draw a programme that will see all local-based players assemble for training at least two days a week
- Having reached the African Games final, Kenya should now aim at the podium of the next edition of the African Nations Championship
It might get dark as you dig into history books to find when Kenya’s men's volleyball team achieved a better finish at a continental competition than the women’s team.
And that is why Wafalme Stars’ silver medal at the recently concluded African Games will go down in history as their best performance ever at a continental competition.
The only other time the men’s team reached the podium was at their previous appearance in 2011 Maputo, Mozambique, where they bragged bronze with the majority of the team comprising Kenya Prisons players who had claimed silver in the Africa Clubs Championship earlier that year.
The fact that Wafalme Stars finished a position higher than Malkia Strikers points to their potential. They lost 3-0 in the final to an Egyptian side that is not only ranked 18th in the world but top of Africa and has already qualified for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games; the continent’s sole representative in the French capital.
Kenya, on the other hand, are ranked seventh in Africa and 58th in the world, meaning they have a mountain to climb before dining with the elite class of African and global volleyball. But there is hope and plenty of it!
Cameroon, who Kenya convincingly beat 3-0 in the semi-finals, were the defending African Games champions and are ranked third in Africa and 29th in the world. It’s a pity that despite the African Games running under the Confederation of African Volleyball, participating teams could not earn FIVB ranking points.
This partly explains why countries like Algeria and Libya (men) failed to register for the tournament despite reaching the podium at the African Nations Championship last year in Cairo, Egypt.
Weekly training sessions
However, this doesn’t take the gloss from Kenya’s performance in Accra, Ghana. Reaching the final with a squad of local-based players speaks volumes of the strength of our local league, which has tremendously improved over the years.
It’s no surprise Equity Bank middle blocker Wilson Cheruiyot and General Service Unit outside hitter Nicholas Matui made it to the Team of the Tournament. With a strong base of quality local players, the technical bench led by Gideon Tarus and Elisha Aliwa should now embark on polishing the aspect of team chemistry, which has been our main undoing in major competitions.
Since the 2021 African Nations Championship held in Kigali, Rwanda, to last year’s edition in Cairo, Egypt, the national team has grown with every passing game, unfortunately hitting their peak towards the tail end of the competition where it matters less.
With the Kenya Volleyball Federation (KVF) now in partnership with Java House as their catering partner, providing meals during training is no longer a problem. The technical bench should draw a programme that will see all local-based players assemble for training at least two days a week, Friday and Saturday, especially when the national league is on a break.
These weekly sessions will help the technical bench understand players better and build team cohesion and coordination. It will also give the coaches enough time to gauge the potential of young prospects instead of rushing them to deliver in major competitions where the stakes are usually high.
Having reached the African Games final, Kenya should now aim at the podium of the next edition of the African Nations Championship, which will be in 2026.
Two years is enough time to prepare for this continental tournament. The weekly sessions and international friendlies with neighbouring countries in Zone Five should be considered.
Foreign coach
What we can’t afford to do is to sit back and repeat what we have been doing in the past and hope for a miracle come 2026. We cannot wait to assemble the team in 2026 for a month or less, train locally and hope that we will somehow beat Egypt, Tunisia or Libya, who will have already played at the 2025 World Championships.
In addition to the weekly sessions, KVF could also consider applying for Targeted Support under the FIVB Volleyball Empowerment Programme, which will go a long way in improving the standard of the men’s game.
Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco - all ranked above Kenya - have tapped into the Italian school, hiring Flavio Gulinelli, Antonio Giacobbe and Paolo Montagnani to manage their national teams through Volleyball Empowerment support.
An experienced foreign coach will not only change the team’s mentality but also open the doors for more players to start playing abroad in top European leagues through their networks.
He should also work closely with our local coaches and help them align with the high demands of top-level volleyball and the ripple effect will trickle down to our local clubs, resulting in a wholesome change in the landscape of men’s volleyball in our country.
If we start putting in the work now, the 2027 World Championship looks like a realistic target because Africa will have three representatives after the FIVB Board approved the expansion from 24 teams to 32 teams starting with the 2025 edition.
Kenya only needs to finish in the top three in the 2026 African Nations Championship and Wafalme Stars will write history by qualifying for the 2027 edition of the World Championship for the first time.
Come on you, Wafalme, the dream is on!
