The 1972 national men’s soccer team was by far the greatest group Kenya has ever produced all the years of its existence.
They qualified for the finals that were staged in Cameroon and performed well via displaying their credentials in ensuring that none of the three sides they came up against did not prevent them from scoring.
They scored in every match in the tournament.Despite losing once, drawing twice and finishing third in ‘the group of death,’ the feat still remains the biggest achievement just yet as no other group since then has played as well as they did.
Boasting a wealth of talent across the squad, the group missed out narrowly on advancing to the knockout stages of the competition after finishing behind Cameroon and the then African heavyweights Mali.
Kenya lost its first match by two goals to one against a good Cameroon side on the 23rd of February, 1972 before playing out to one-all draws with Mali and Togo on the 26th and the 29th respectively.
Pacy defender Jonathan Niva got the goal in the opening game against Cameroon when he hammered a free kick into the back of the Cameroonian net just before halftime after Cameroon had taken the lead in the 7th minute and then doubled their advantage in the 20th minute.
On match day two against Mali, Kenya had to sweat to remain in the game after their opponents went ahead on the stroke of halftime. Daniel Arudhi restored parity on the hour mark to make sure Kenya went home with at least a point.
On matchday three, Kenya were supposed to avoid defeat against Togo and hope that Mali does not get a result against Cameroon to go through.
It was however heartbreaking as despite going ahead on the half-hour mark through Peter Ouma, Kenya allowed Togo back into the game when they got an equalizer in the 60th minute.
Harambee stars’ 2003 group had about similar characteristics as the group of 1972 but sadly did not get into the knockout stages.
The qualifiers are to continue with Ghanaians in waiting and hopefully, the national team side shall prevail and achieve better results than the previous teams if we really do qualify.
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