World Rugby High Performance Consultant Peter Drewett travelled with the Kenya Simbas to South Africa as they continue with their Rugby World Cup Qualifier preparations.
He was with them during their one week training camp in October and has been working closely with the technical team led by Head Coach Paul Odera in ensuring the team gets the adequate preparation they require ahead of the 2022 RWC Qualifiers.
Speaking at the Stellenbosch Academy of Sport, Mr. Drewett started off by seconding Coach Odera’s comments on the positive lessons the team picked from their encounter with the Carling Champions team on Saturday 6th November. “This week, we have reviewed that much and we are now putting into practice some elements that we need to work on like ensuring our defense outside the 13th channel is strong, reloading off the floor and realigning so that on attack we have 13 people able to attack and 13 able to defend,” he said.
He also thanked the Stellenbosch Academy of Sport for availing their center to the team(s) for training and for ensuring all equipment are readily available based on each team’s training schedule. “This morning we were up very early, did a good fitness session where we put the boys under pressure and adding some skills into that, we just finished 90 minutes of pitch training session and in the afternoon, we will have an hour with two specialist coaches working with us on our line outs as well as our kicking,” he added.
With the availability of all these facilities, the players will keep learning and improving their rugby knowledge over the next few weeks. They had four scheduled matches in South Africa which is similar to the RWC Qualifiers in France next year, so this in a way, is a rehearsal.
Bethwel Anami is one of the new players in the Simbas set up and he termed the match against the Carling Team as an eye opener as it was completely different from what he has been accustomed to back home. “The intensity and conditioning level of the players was on a top class. I however realized that whenever we were in possession of the ball, we kept our opponents under pressure and as we head into the match against Namibia, we will need to ensure that we keep possession of the ball, we also require to polish up on our set pieces so that we’re ready to face them head on,” he said.
Kenya Rugby Union would like to thank World Rugby and Rugby Africa for their support in ensuring the players travel for this tournament that will go a long way in ensuring they are ready for the Qualifiers next year as well as the Government of Kenya for its continuous support towards the Union through the Ministry of Sports Culture Heritage.
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