{"id":7924,"date":"2020-05-17T18:53:01","date_gmt":"2020-05-17T18:53:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.com\/kenya\/?p=7924"},"modified":"2020-05-17T18:53:01","modified_gmt":"2020-05-17T18:53:01","slug":"okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sport\/okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough","title":{"rendered":"Okwach prides in Kenya Sevens breakthrough"},"content":{"rendered":"

AfricaPress-Kenya:<\/strong> Athletes hope to make a good impression when given the first chance and Kenya Sevens youngster Geoffrey Okwach is no exception.<\/p>\n

An excellent performance on debut would go a long way in earning a player the faith of their coach and the 20-year-old KCB winger knows this only too well.<\/p>\n

“Playing for the national team is a great challenge and nobody really cares about your age. It’s about performance and everyone expects you to help the team get positive results,” says Okwach.<\/p>\n

“The only advantage the senior players have over us is experience but that is something which can be acquired with time,” he adds.<\/p>\n

Okwach, who is a Law student at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa, burst into the limelight at the Hamilton Sevens in January when he scored a try on his World Sevens Series debut as Kenya’s Shujaa stunned South Africa 36-14 in New Zealand.<\/p>\n

It was Kenya’s first Series win over the much fancied Blitzboks since 2015.<\/p>\n

“I had a lot of confidence after the coach named me in the team. My target was to start scoring and I was very optimistic since the South African team was quite similar to the one we beat at the 2019 Safari Sevens,” Okwach recalls.<\/p>\n

“I told myself that I must score and it was nice that the pass came from Injera (Collins) who happened to be my roommate during the tournament.”<\/p>\n

Okwach, alongside Johnstone Olindi, Mwamba’s Daniel Taabu and Vincent Onyalla, represent a crop of exciting youngsters who are slowly but steadily making a name for themselves in national colours.<\/p>\n

Okwach’s passion for the game was fuelled by his university coach Simon Jawichre, a man he labels as a pioneer of age-grade rugby.<\/p>\n

“He (Jawichre) is not only concerned with rugby but he also ensures that one does the right thing regarding their education. He is a father in a way” Okwach says.<\/p>\n

Okwach, who has also had a stint with Kenya Rugby Union Championship side Northern Suburbs, is the only player representing all the male national teams – Kenya Sevens, Kenya 15s and under-20.<\/p>\n

With sporting activities currently halted due to the coronavirus pandemic, Okwach has brought to the fore his writing talent by launching a rugby blog where he shares his experiences.<\/p>\n

“I have good writing skills and I have a lot of experiences in the game which I feel should be put in writing. A lot of things have happened in my rugby journey and these are the things I blog about.”<\/p>\n

Okwach’s brilliant perfomance for the under-20 team in 2019 earned him the Most Promising Player award at the Sports Personality of the Year Awards gala.<\/p>\n

He could, however, not attend the January ceremony due to Kenya Sevens duty in Hamilton.<\/p>\n

“I never knew such a category existed and my nomination came as a surprise. I was hopeful of winning since I had a successful year.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AfricaPress-Kenya: Athletes hope to make a good impression when given the first chance and Kenya Sevens youngster Geoffrey Okwach is no exception. An excellent performance on debut would go a long way in earning a player the faith of their coach and the 20-year-old KCB winger knows this only too well. “Playing for the national […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":7920,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,8,17],"tags":[3588,2446,3589],"class_list":["post-7924","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-homepage-english","category-sport","tag-7s","tag-kru","tag-sevens"],"yoast_head":"\nOkwach prides in Kenya Sevens breakthrough - kenya<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Athletes hope to make a good impression when given the first chance and Kenya Sevens youngster Geoffrey Okwach is no exception.\u00a0An excellent performance\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sport\/okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Okwach prides in Kenya Sevens breakthrough\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Athletes hope to make a good impression when given the first chance and Kenya Sevens youngster Geoffrey Okwach is no exception.\u00a0An excellent performance\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sport\/okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"kenya\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-05-17T18:53:01+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/eritrea\/sites\/28\/2020\/05\/obihg69hitarkb5ec04e858ed27.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"528\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sport\/okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sport\/okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Okwach prides in Kenya Sevens breakthrough\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-05-17T18:53:01+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sport\/okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough\"},\"wordCount\":493,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sport\/okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/eritrea\/sites\/28\/2020\/05\/obihg69hitarkb5ec04e858ed27.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"7s\",\"KRU\",\"sevens\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"homepage-english\",\"sport\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sport\/okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sport\/okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sport\/okwach-prides-in-kenya-sevens-breakthrough\",\"name\":\"Okwach prides in Kenya Sevens breakthrough - 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