Battered Harambee Stars head to the Far East

Kenya’s Harambee Stars are scheduled to arrive in Bangkok early Saturday morning ahead of an international friendly match against their host Thailand on Sunday.

The Stars flew out of Iraq for Doha, Qatar Friday afternoon, and were scheduled to catch a connecting flight to Thailand at 9pm Friday night.

Vasalunds IF midfielder Eric Johanna was however not part of the travelling contingent, as he had to return to his employers who had requested that he returns in time for their weekend Swedish third tier league match against Akropolis IF.

This will be the Kenya’s second meeting with Thailand following their very first encounter on January 20, 1990 during the Kings Cup in Thailand where Stars lost 2-1.

It will also be the second international friendly match in three days for Kenya who lost 2-1 to Iraq on Thursday evening away at the Basra Stadium.

Coach Stanley Okumbi received considerable flak from local football enthusiasts following that result, and it will be eager to appease the fans by providing a good follow up in Sunday’s friendly.

“This part of the world is quite unfamiliar to many of these players. Even the style of play is different here but at least they got a taste of what to expect when we played in Iraq. I am assessing the players even in these very different environment and I can see that most of them are coping quite well,” Okumbi said.

Considering the fact that Thailand are ranked 49 places below Kenya in the Fifa World Rankings, overcoming them shouldn’t be a difficult task, and Okumbi will need to do this in order to convince fans that Kenya is capable of dealing with Ghana in the upcoming 2019 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers.

Against Iraq, Kenya was sunk by goals from Hekmat Nouri and Ahmed Ibrahim in the 17th and 45th minutes. Spanish La Liga plying Michael Olunga pulled a goal back for the Stars in the 85th minute.