Michael Olunga grabbed a quickfire brace inside the opening first six minutes of Kenya’s World Cup qualifier against Seychelles on November 20.
Kenya’s national football team, Harambee Stars, lined up against Seychelles at the Stade Felix Houphouet-Boigny in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, looking to bounce back from the agonising last-gasp loss to Gabon in their first game last week.
Seychelles will use foreign grounds for the 2026 World Cup qualifiers as they do not have a CAF-approved stadium. They had lost 9-0 to the group’s favourites Ivory Coast in their opening game.
Kenya’s Head Coach Engin Firat made two changes from that starting XI, with Eric Johanna and Eric ‘Marcelo’ Ouma taking the places of Kenneth Muguna and Aboud Omar, respectively.
Michael Olunga vs Seychelles
Olunga, who is the team’s captain, capitalised on a misplaced pass for the Seychelles defence before losing Lucas Panayi on the edge of the area. The Al-Duhail striker then slammed the ball past Carlos Simeon in goal for his first of the night.
Barely three minutes later, the former Gor Mahiacaptain was at it again. Marcelo started the move with a sweetly floated ball into the area, which Olunga beautifully brought down. His first shot was saved by Simeone, but the striker was quick to react to the rebound, slotting in Kenya’s second.
In first-half stoppage time, a quick throw-in from Marcelo caught the Seychelles defence napping. The Swedish-based defender found Masoud Juma, who scored his second goal of the qualifiers with a low and hard shot to put Kenya three to the good inside the first 45 minutes.
First replaced Marcelo with Aboud Omar at the start of the second half, with Kenya picking up from where they had left from.
In the 52nd minute, Omar’s cutback into the area missed everybody but fell kindly to Rooney Onyango, who thumped in his first international goal.
He later turned provider after he maximised on Seychelles’ attempt to play from the back. He squared off the ball to his teammate Benson Omala, who had just been brought on for Masoud Juma.
Kenya had numerous chances to widen their scoreline but failed to do so. This was, nonetheless, one of the biggest scorelines in the history of Kenyan football.
Firat’s men will now play Burundi and Ivory Coast next year at home.
Kenyan celebration on EAFC 24
Kimbiblog Sports has also reported that a m Sven Yidah has made it way to the popular video game EAFC 24.
The latest edition of the game, formerly known as FIFA, was released on September 29 with a number of upgrades and additions to enhance the user experience.
One interesting new addition is the HyperMotion technology that aims to increase the authenticity of football gameplay.