Basketball in Africa

Story by PHILIP ONYANGO
Publication Date: 10/30/2007

Kenya Ports Authority women basketball team quietly returned home on Sunday night after finishing a eighth and blamed their poor showing at the just concluded Africa Club championship in Mozambique to injuries.

Team Manager Edward Oduor while conceding that the standards displayed by other teams at the championships were higher, said the team should have performed much better if all the players were fully fit.

He said the Olympic qualifiers which ended in Senegal a fortnight before the club championships had dealt the team a major blow after all the players returned with injuries.

“We had to leave our dependable post players Yvonne Akinyi behind due to illness while the other three players Caroline Arato, Miriam Awuor and Millicent Anyango had to play with injuries at the championships since there was no time for them to recover after returning from Senegal”, he said.

Arato Oduor says for example played only the opening match but could not effectively play in the rest of the championship.

KPA who lost their opening three matches sneaked into the quarters after beating Lupopo from DR Congo in the last group match 53-37.

Detailed report

But that was the best the dockers could do at the 16-team championships as they went ahead to lose 45-54 to Desportivo of Mozambique in the quarterfinals.

They then lost the classification game against First Bank from Nigeria to finish in position eight.

Oduor who promised the give a detailed report later after the technical bench have done their review of the championship, was full of praise for Caroline Mireji whom he says played a great game.

“Mireji was very strong in the air controlling the boards both on offense and defense and actually helped the team a lot in a maiden appearance for the team at the international scene”, Oduor said.

Desportivo of Mozambique were crowned new champions after beating defending champions Primero De Agosto 76-65 in a tough final.