JOHANNESBURG – Kenya qualified for the 2020 Olympics after won the 2019 Rugby Africa Sevens tournament in Brakpan on Saturday.
Kenya secured a 29-0 victory over their neighbours Uganda in the final. Kenya proved too strong for Madagascar in the semifinal round, winning 40-14.
Kenya will join South Africa in representing Africa at the Olympic Games. Uganda and Zimbabwe have another chance as they will be competing in Olympic repechage tournament next year.
Paul Feeney, Kenya's coach, said the victory was the result of planning and hard work.
"The boys played very well. We had a plan of how we wanted to play in this tournament," said Feeney. "The players worked very hard throughout the competition. They trained for 11 weeks nonstop. We will take a break, then prepare for the 2019/20 World Rugby Sevens Series."
%%%twitter https://twitter.com/hashtag/Shujaa?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#ShujaaQualifies For The Tokyo 2020 Olympics https://t.co/0EUeH4IEbe pic.twitter.com/QUlmZkShna
— Kenya Rugby (@OfficialKRU)
Final positions at the Rugby Africa Men’s Sevens 2019:
1 Kenya
2 Uganda
3 Zimbabwe
4 Madagascar
5 Namibia
6 Zambia
7 Senegal
8 Nigeria
9 Ghana
10 Morocco
11 Tunisia
12 Côte d’Ivoire
13 Mauritius
14 Botswana