Kenya Sevens team to play relegation play-off in London

Kenya sevens national rugby team ‘Shujaa’ is set to feature in the four nations HSBC World 7s relegation playoffs in London this week after the team lost all their three pool A fixtures but won their final two fixtures in the 13th place playoffs against USA and Japan to finish 13th overall on 40 points.

The London sevens battle grounds will decide the fate of Uruguay, Kenya and Canada in a winner takes it all after a round robin format competition that will also include Tonga as the Challenger Series champion.

Kenya 7s relegation playoffs fate was confirmed on Saturday after the team lost all their three pool games at the Toulouse sevens held at the Ernest-Wallonand. The team skippered by Nelson Oyoo has now shifted focus to the do or die London sevens.

Despite four straight losses where the team only managed a try in each match except for Samoa’s match, Shujaa recomposed itself to beat USA 19-0 before shutting Japan 33-12 in the 13th place playoff that awarded the team just 3 points while Uruguay bagged 5 points as Canada took 15 points by virtue of reaching the cup semi-finals but remained 14th overall with 39 points.

The 16 team World Rugby 7s competition which is trying to align with the 12-team Olympics competition model, sees Shujaa risking losing their core status earned in the 1999/2000 season and the only way out of the mess is by living to expectations against Tonga and claim redemption through vengeance against Uruguay and Canada.

Going into the 10th leg of HSBC sevens, Kenya needed to reach the Main Cup semi-finals while hoping that Uruguay and Spain featured in 13th place playoffs but that dream went up in smoke.

Kenya lost 19-5 to Uruguay, 31-5 to New Zealand and 33-7 to Canada at the pool stage before losing to Samoa (17-10) at the 9th place quarterfinal. After losing their opening two matches, they needed to beat Canada at least 30-0 to get a six point’s difference over Canada and one point over Uruguay but the team lost by a big margin instead and dropped to the 9th place contention.

Uruguay sadly relinquished position 11 after the side lost 15-31 to Fiji in the 9th place semifinal to collect 5 points for a tally of 54 while Spain bagged 7 for a tally of 55.

All eyes are now on how coach Damian McGrath’s coached side will fare in the incoming playoffs but unfortunately the same squad that lost all their three pool fixtures including to two of their incoming playoffs rivals floats up doubts whether the team will rise up to the occasion with such weak odds.