Africa is rising, and Kenya is being left behind
Sports
By
Kazungu Koome
| Jun 23, 2026
Norway's midfielder #06 Patrick Berg and Senegal's forward #18 Ismaila Sarr during the 2026 World Cup Group I football match at the New York/New Jersey Stadium in East Rutherford, on June 22, 2026. [AFP]
On a sticky night in North America, a goalkeeper from a country most fans would struggle to find on a map kept the European champions out almost on his own.
His name is Vozinha, and he tends goal for Cape Verde, a string of volcanic islands flung into the Atlantic and home to barely 525,000 people.
Spain came at him in waves; seven times he turned them away. The match finished goalless. A nation smaller than Nakuru town had stood toe to toe with one of the giants of the game and refused to flinch.
I keep turning that picture over because of the quiet question it asks of us back home. A country you could lose inside a single Kenyan county is rubbing shoulders with Spain at the World Cup.
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Kenya, all 50-something million of us, a footballing nation in our own heads if nowhere else, has never once been there. If that stings, let it. There is a lesson buried in it.
This past weekend sharpened the picture. Ivory Coast pushed Germany all the way before losing 2-1, and Tunisia were pulled apart 4-0 by Japan, becoming the first African side knocked out.
Sunday was kinder: Egypt brushed New Zealand aside 3-1, and little Cape Verde did it again, holding two-time world champions Uruguay to a 2-2 draw after already frustrating Spain. The islanders refuse to read the script the world keeps handing them.
The wider tournament, the first with 48 teams and a record ten African sides, has become a mirror held up to the continent. Take DR Congo, back in the World Cup for the first time since 1974, who cast a net across their diaspora and drew with Cristiano Ronaldo's Portugal.
Kenya has a diaspora too, scattered through Europe's lower leagues, mostly uncalled. We treat our talent abroad as a rumour; the Congolese treated theirs as an asset. Then there are the ghosts: Nigeria and Cameroon, African royalty, did not even make it so much for pedigree. A famous shirt does not buy you a seat at the table; structure, consistency and ruthless preparation do.
Morocco shows the reward for patience, arriving as genuine contenders four years after reaching a World Cup semifinal, the dividend of two decades of academies and planning. South Africa showed the opposite, opening with two red cards and nine men against Mexico. Talent is thrown away through indiscipline. We know that script far too well.
And now the group stage reaches its reckoning. Earlier on Tuesday at 3am Senegal faced Norway and Algeria met Jordan at 6am, both chasing a place in the last 32, while Ghana take on England in the pick of the round. DR Congo meets Colombia tomorrow.
Thursday brings Ivory Coast, Tunisia, Morocco and South Africa. Egypt close the account against Iran on Friday. By the weekend, we will know how many of the ten survive.
So where does that leave Harambee Stars? In 2027, Kenya co-hosts Afcon, and for once the continent comes to us. We are building stadiums, but stadiums are the easy part. Concrete cannot pass, press or finish.
The harder work is the academy pipeline, the school system, a league that pays on time, and a federation that does not collapse into boardroom warfare every election season.
Cape Verde did not wait for perfect conditions. They built an identity and walked onto the biggest stage without apology. We have more people, more money and more raw talent than that little archipelago will ever produce. What we have never managed is seriousness.
The only question left is whether a nation of fifty million is finally ready to listen.