Kenya’s hopes of attaining good results in the inaugural Olympics rugby sevens competition were dashed after they finished in 11th position in the overall standings. The Shujaas team registered losses against Great Britain, New Zealand, Japan and Spain before finally overcoming hosts Brazil in their last match. The team that had the attention of the world after winning the Singapore sevens title in the 2015/2016 IRB series, was targeting a high placed finish at the competition, and many had earmarked them for at least a top five position. This was not to be, however, as they lost their first match to finalists Great Britain, who had a great ensemble that included renown players from England, Wales and Scotland, including England sevens mavericks Dan Bibby and Tom Mitchell, consigned team Kenya to their first defeat, with a 31-7 win. In the next game they faced favorites New Zealand, and even though they got off to a good start with a Collins Injera try, they lost the game 28-5.
In what proved to be a pivotal group match, the Kenya sevens team came up against underdogs Japan, who had earlier produced a brilliant performance to defeat New Zealand 14-12 in what was the shock result of the tournament. Injera’s class ensured that they didn’t come out of the game empty handed as he registered Kenya’s only try in a 31-7 loss against the Asian team. Benjamin Ayimba, the team’s coach, had no excuses for the poor performance, “It was another bad day in the office against Japan, but I think that’s the game that we played with all of our hearts and I’m happy we didn’t dip,” he said, “Usually we perform well on the first match than the last against Japan we showed a lot of spirit and I’m happy that’s the case.”
In the last game on Thursday to determine the rankings, Kenya defeated Brazil 24-0 to finish 11th, with three tries from Billy ‘The kid’ Odhiambo, and one from Willy Ambaka. Fiji were the eventual winners of the Olympics rugby competition, winning the first ever men’s Olympics rugby sevens gold medal after defeating Great Britain 43-7. Meanwhile, South Africa scooped the bronze medal after defeating Japan 54-14.