Africa-Press – Kenya. Kenya crushed 38-29 to Rwanda in the semi-finals of the Under-18 International Handball Federation (IHF) Trophy Africa Zone Five at Ulinzi Sports Complex to relinquish the title they won last year.
Kenya, who qualified for the last four without losing any of their Group B fixtures, got off to a bright start with two quick goals.
But Rwanda rallied to tie the scores 3-3 and soon moved up with their next possession to take a 4-3 lead and never looked back. From that point in time, the Rwandese went on to build a four-goal cushion at 12-8 and 14-10.
Kenya did well to cut the margin to two but again didn’t push much as the winners raced away to a 17-14-half-time lead.
After the breather, Akayezu Andre’s opener got Rwanda off to a flying start, taking the scores to 20-15, 25-20 and 30-23.
The Rwandese kept hammering at the Kenyan defence, taking their biggest lead of 11 goals with 11 minutes left to play.
It was wave after wave of green shirts as Rwanda’s goalkeeper repelled every Kenyan attack with the scores at 34-23. Juma Gerald said: “We lost because we had very many missed passes. Any time we lost, they scored.”
He went on: “We have a bronze medal game against Ethiopia and we will prepare well for it. We are not giving up yet.”
Rwanda will meet Burundi in the final Saturday. The Burundians, who won their group game 45-44, dismissed Ethiopia 33-26 in the other semis.
The winners in the two categories youth U-18 and Junior U-20 will represent the region at the continental show in December.
Kenya U-20 pulled away from a 10-10 halftime to beat Ethiopia 28-19 at Nyayo Stadium. Ethan Situma bagged six goals in a classification game.
“We underrated them and also went into this game having been demoralized for not making the semis. But we were psyched up in the second half to win it,” said goalkeeper Paul Opiyo.
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