Kenya men’s coach Lameck Onyango has expressed serious concern about his players’ concentration levels in the Cricket World Cup Challenge (CWC) League “A” in Nairobi.
On Wednesday, the hosts suffered their second defeat in the One Day International (ODI) tournament after going down by 97 runs to Kuwait at Ruaraka Sports Ground Club.
Onyango blamed the embarrassing loss on a lack of concentration by his boys since they dropped two crucial catches, with one being Kuwait’s opening batsman Ravija Sandaruwan, who top scored with 67 runs from 52 balls. All-rounder Vraj Patel was the culprit in the first incident that happened in the third over.
Kenya also dropped two catches towards the end of their four-wicket loss to Denmark at Nairobi Gymkhana on Sunday.
“When we were fielding, we dropped some two crucial catches earlier on and that is where the game changed because the player who was first dropped was on 10 runs, but he ended up scoring 67 runs. If you do the deduction, we would have been chasing around 220 runs,” said a visibly dejected Onyango.
“It (dropping catches) seems a big problem, but we normally do give them (players) catches in training. I think it is more of a lack of concentration being in the game. Like today, maybe he was not expecting the ball to go to him, but that is what happened,” added the former Kenya international.
Jersey, Papua New Guinea (PNG), Qatar, and Denmark are the other teams featuring in the tournament, which is the first round of qualifiers for the 2027 Cricket World Cup.
The global championships will be co-hosted by South Africa, Namibia, and Zimbabwe in October and November.
The top two sides from the group at the end of three rounds in 2026 will secure a spot in the World Cup qualifier play-offs. Kenya opened her campaign in the competition with a six-wicket win over Jersey at Ruaraka Sports Club Ground on September 25.
Having won three matches out of four, Jersey tops the standings with six points. Kuwait and Denmark, follow in that order with six and four points. PNG, who have one match in hand are fourth with four points, two more than fifth placed Kenya. Winless Qatar are bottom with zero points.
Batting first after losing the toss, Kuwait set an impressive target of 312 runs for the loss of eight wickets in 50 overs of their innings.
In their chase, Kenya hit 215 runs all-out in 41.2 overs of their innings.
After Vraj Patel dropped the ball from Sandaruwan’s shot in the third over, the opening batsman held his ground until the 16.4 over. Interestingly, it was Vraj Patel who caught him off Lucas Oluoch’s bowling. Like in their matches against Jersey and Denmark, Kenya’s top-batting department again crumbled early against Kuwait.
But Onyango was of the view that his top-order batsmen have performed well in the tournament.
“The catches they (Kuwait) took were very good ones, so you cannot say that a batsman threw his wicket away. They (Kuwait players) dived and took the catches, which on our part we failed, catches win matches,” said the coach.
Opening batsman Rushab Patel left the crease in the second over after just hitting two runs from five balls. His partner Pushkar Sharma was Kenya’s top scorer with 50 runs from 45 balls.
Sharma was dismissed in the 12th over after being caught by Meet Bhavsar off Sayed Monib’s bowling. Earlier in the eighth over, Kenya’s third batsman Dhiren Gondaria left the crease with just 18 runs from 20 balls.
It was also not a good day for middle-order batsman Rakep Patel, as he delivered just 23 runs from 34 balls. Rakep Patel has been Kenya’s best player in the tournament.
After top scoring with 84 runs and taking the most wickets at six in the match against Jersey, the all-rounder impressed with 85 runs.
He was not out in the two matches. In the other match played yesterday, Denmark defeated Qatar by three wickets at Nairobi Gymkhana.
The tournament resumes Friday after a one-day rest. Kenya will face Qatar at Nairobi Gymkhana, while PNG will clash with Kuwait.
Source link : https://nation.africa/kenya/sports/cricket/kenya-fall-to-kuwait-as-coach-onyango-blames-lack-of-focus-4784154
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Publish date : 2024-10-02 17:00:38
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