Kenya national team head coach Benni McCarthy has explained why they decided to withdraw from the Four-Nation Pre-African Nations Championship tournament that was scheduled to kick off on Monday.
The mini-tournament was scheduled to take place in Arusha, Tanzania with hosts Tanzania, Uganda and defending CHAN champions Kenya.
With his squad already in Arusha, having left Nairobi this past weekend, it was a decision that was met with dismay and shock, but in a statement released by Kenya Football Federation (FKF) they supported McCarthy’s recommendation to return back home.
“Tanzania was just a misfortune, we went there with good intentions but unfortunately for football reasons, football decisions, it wasn’t according to our satisfaction,” McCarthy told the media on Wednesday morning.
“The team and the technical team came together and said that we thinking very highly of ourselves and want to have the best preparations for CHAN, we want to be ready for CHAN and if we were to continue in that tournament, it would have set us back majorly.
“We’d probably lose players to injury because the conditions were not favourable for us to work in… in an environment where we could keep all our players fit and play at the highest and best level we expect from ourselves.
“We felt it was best for the safety of our players and well-being of the players, and everyone involved in the squad, it was best not to participate and come back, to have the best possible training, last bit of camp left, that can optimise our chances, in a group of death at CHAN.
“If we’re not properly prepared, we will have shortcomings and people will ask questions, we didn’t want to have excuses if we have difficulties in the group stages, so us coming back to Kenya will give us the best chance to progress from the group stages. Where we were meant to train was not ideal, seven days there…”
The Harambee Stars are in Group A alongside, Angola, DR Congo, Morocco and Zambia, with their opening game on 3 August against The Leopards.
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