The Kenyan football national team, Harambee Stars, has been slotted to group E in the 2022 world cup qualifiers. The draw was done on Tuesday, 21st January 2020, in The Nile Ritz-Carlton hotel located in Cairo, Egypt.
The draw saw Harambee stars being tied with its East African neighbors Uganda and Rwanda. On the tie also is the Mali national team, Les Aigles. The draw consisted of forty teams representing forty countries in Africa that were pooled into groups of four. Only a single team that will be leading in each pool will be proceeding to the quarter-finals of the competition.
The 2022 world cup qualifier draws
GROUP A
Algeria
Burkina Faso
Niger
Djibouti
GROUP B
Tunisia
Zambia
Mauritania
Equatorial Guinea
GROUP C
Nigeria
Cape Verde
The central African Republic
Liberia
GROUP D
Cameroon
Ivory Coast
Mozambique
Malawi
GROUP E
Mali
Uganda
Kenya
Rwanda
GROUP F
Egypt
Gabon
Libya
Angola
GROUP G
Ghana
South Africa
Zimbabwe
Ethiopia
GROUP H
Senegal
Congo
Namibia
Togo
GROUP I
Morocco
Guinea
Guinea-Bissau
Sudan
GROUP J
DR Congo
Benin
Madagascar
Tanzania
The pots
All the forty teams were however slotted to 4 different pots. The overall pots of the competition are as follows:
The 2019 CAF finalists Senegal and Algeria were however placed together along with Tunisia, Morocco, Ghana, Egypt, Mali and the Democratic Republic of Congo in the first pot. Similarly, 2nd pot has seen Burkina Faso placed along with South Africa, Guinea, Uganda, Cape Verde, Gabon, Benin, Zambia, Congo, and Côte d’Ivoire. Pot 3 consists of Madagascar, Mauritania, Libya, Mozambique, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Niger, Central African Republic, Namibia, Guinea-Bissau while Pot 4 has Malawi, Angola, Togo, Sudan, Rwanda, Tanzania, Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia, Liberia, and Djibouti.
Kenya has however not been performing exceptionally well in the competition. This will be their 13th time in a row they will be vying for a place in the FIFA world cup, a competition they have never participated before. In the 2018 world cup qualification, the 2-1 aggregate against cape Verde saw Kenya being bundled out of the competition. Despite getting a home win in Nyayo stadium through Olunga’s only match goal, the 2-0 away loss to Cape Verde turned things around. The win thus saw Cape Verde advance to the third and final rounds.
Harambee stars had however started the qualification campaign on a high note after thrashing Mauritius 5-2. Omollo, Olunga, Ayub Timbe, and Haron Shakav were on target in the match to help Kenya secure a historic away win. The two teams, however, stumbled in a draw in a return match at Kasarani, an advantage to the stars to advance.
