The Standard Chartered sponsored Impala Saracens Ladies team emerged 3rd in the first leg of the 2018 KRU Women’s League played at a dusty USIU rugby grounds yesterday 4th February 2018.
An opening 5-7 loss at the hands of a highly experienced Mwamba RFC did not scorch the hopes off the Impala Ladies. They registered two very important wins in their next 2 matches. A convincing 12-5 win against an athletic Northern Suburbs side & an even bigger 21-3 win against a developing side – COMRAS.
Winnie Awino, Impala tournament day captain confirmed that Impala was the better team at breakdown compared to Homeboyz at the Main cup semi, “We dominated the break down but could not swing the ball out wide early enough. If we only found a way to swing it out to the open ends, we could have been in the final. It was a little disappointing to watch Homeboyz score against us with the clock ticking quickly.”
Although the Impala Ladies lost to Homeboyz, they were not going to let Nakuru slip away with the 3rd place honors easily. Nakuru scored early in the first half & defended very well for a better part of the match only to cave in to Judith Auma’s constant pounding of the defence. On her most courageous, she proved that high risk = high returns. Breaking off a tackle with inches away from touch, she changed direction & glided back into the 15, took a glance at her defender, pulled her in, paused momentarily, destabilized her & then quickly shifted direction. A 70 metre chase that ended at the try box. Anne Ng’ang’a converted to secure the third place win for Impala.
Homeboyz won this leg of the League after beating Mwamba 19-17
Team Coach Maria Otieno:
We’ll definitely do better when the series moves to KCB on 18th February 2018. We built up stealthily into the opponents’ 22, but when it was time to pounce into the try box, we seemed to not explore a second option other than carrying it in. If we can sort out our passing within kill zone, we can easily get into the finals.
