AFC Leopards squad which on Wednesday 30 pulled a 2-1 comeback win over “small brother” Kakamega Homeboyz in the Sportpesa Premier League will today (Thursday 31) enjoy a swimming session to aid recovery, while those who didn’t make the final 18 will play a friendly match.
The friendly will be against the recently constituted AFC Leopards U19 team at Marist,Karen.
“No party just yet, today we resume work in the morning and the whole of this week there will be no rest. Players who played last evening will today go swimming and the others will play a friendly match,” The Belgian told Soka25east.com.
“Today I want to see my U19 so we will play against them, to see if I can find a new leopard for the future.”
“Ingwe” stormed back to the top of the league table with the fourth win in six matches, which put them above Tusker (13 points) who lie second with a point less. Leopards remain unscathed thus far, a record which does not worry Ivan as he thinks it’s not a big deal.
“Unbeaten or not is not the question, the question is how to progress to the next game. Besides pressure will be on our opponents because for us we are in the first position.”
Charles Momanyi gave the visitors a dream start with a 9th minute goal which stood up to the end of first half; on resumption, the hungry leopards restored parity with Eugene Ambulwa’s 54th minute strike, before Kepha Aswani scored the second deep into the half for a 2-1 final score.
The tactician singled out a few players for a wonderful show despite a disjointed start to the match played at Nyayo Stadium.
“First half was difficult. We lacked fluidity but most important is we won. We are top of the table and we need to stay there. Omune played very well; he played at 6 and 8 and did wonderful. Aswani is a great striker and can score at any moment.” Ivan said.
The 13-times champions’ next assignment will be versus City Stars who also won yesterday in Sunday 3. The Kawangware based side shocked pacesetters Mathare United 2-0 ending their unbeaten run.
“Sunday is difficult, City Stars played well but I am satisfied that we still have a strong bench with players who didn’t play and can play on Sunday.”
@bonfaceosano