Winners of Losers

This past weekend, the Suba Lakers brought two teams to Kisumu to compete in the KYFA tournament. Our Senior team played in the open age category against some of the best teams in the region. One special part of the weekend is one of the club’s good friends, Kelsey Moore, also played with the team. Kelsey had lived in Kisumu for a couple of years and was visiting again this summer. She has come to Mbita several times to help coach our girls. The players were really excited when they found out she was going to play on their team. It always helps to have another mature player that knows how to pass and move the ball around. Our younger players learn a lot from that.

In the first match, we took charge early and won 3-0 against Kasagam. Kelsey scored two goals and Dorothy Adhiambo one. We thought we had another match that day, but had to wait for the next morning. On Saturday, we started off poorly by losing to eventual champion Victoria 3-0. In the next two matches we drew 0-0 with TYSA from Kitale and 1-1 with Smart Ladies from Kisumu when we scored a late equalizer from Pauline Otieno. So we ended up finishing 3rd in our pool of 5 teams and qualified for quarterfinals.

We were matched up against the 2nd best team from the other pool, Ibinzo. They scored in the first half on a clear off-sides infraction that wasn’t called. In the 2nd half we battled hard and even had a chance to equalize, but missed a penalty shot. The girls were exhausted after playing four matches in one day. Fortunately for us, the losers of the quarterfinals had their own consolation playoff. So on Sunday, we played Kisumu Leeds and scored two goals in the 2nd half to come back from behind and win 2-1. The goal scorers were Dorothy Adhiambo and Pauline Otieno. In the consolation Final, we managed to score a lone goal by Irine Achieng to defeat them 1-0. Seven matches in three days concluded with three wins, two losses, two draws and 18 exhausted young girls.

For winning the consolation bracket they received t-shirts and a ball.

It was a great opportunity to compete against good competition. We learned a lot about our team’s strengths and weaknesses and know what to improve in the future.