STARS COACH SACKED

Harambee Stars coach Francis Kimanzi has been fired.

Football Kenya Federation (FKF) made the decision on Tuesday just hours after the national team, arrived back from Togo whether they were eliminated from the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers.

SuperSport.com understands that the entire technical bench has been shown the door.

Earlier in the day, Kimanzi had stated his wish to continue as Stars coach upon arrival from Lome.

“I won’t resign as the coach, if everyone takes the position and keep resigning the team will not go anywhere with that trend. Therefore I will not quit as the coach since I need more time with the team,” he said.

FKF had on Monday intimated that it intended to overhaul the national team’s technical bench in the wake of Harambee Stars’ poor performances.

A statement by FKF chairman Sam Nyamweya had said that the federation was deeply concerned with poor results despite its concerted efforts to prepare the team for its assignments.

Kenya went down 1-0 to Togo last Sunday, a week after losing by a similar margin to Namibia in a 2014 World Cup qualifier. In three matches, Stars are yet to score a goal and have only one point claimed against Malawi on June 2.

Nyamweya said that the federation had everything within its power to prepare the team and had given in to every request made by the technical bench.

We gave the coach everything he requested for including paying allowances, three weeks training session at Kasarani and Kenya School of Monetary Studies (KSMS), provision of return air tickets for our professional players, ensured availability of Dennis Oliech and Arnold Origi and a three day training camp in Namibia and Ghana.”

“We as a federation are awaiting the technical report by the head coach and our head of delegation regarding the two matches.”

“As the federation gears towards the forthcoming assignments including World Cup qualifiers and Cecafa Senior Challenge Cup, we are looking into issues of overhauling the entire technical bench and injecting more young blood in the playing unit in our efforts to rebuild Kenyan football,” continued the statement.

The decision brings to an end an eventful seventh month stint in charge of the national team for Kimanzi.

Reappointed in November last year, Kimanzi won four matches, lost four and drawn one.

It was his second spell in charge of the team, having coaches it for nine months in 2008 and early 2009 and led it to the final round of the 2010 World Cup qualifiers.

A holder of a Uefa A licence, Kimanzi then spent a year in Holland before coming back home in March last year and joined Sofapaka.

Upon election as chairman, Nyamweya’s first act was to install Kimanzi as national coach replacing Zedekiah Otieno.