Okayama, Japan, September 1, 2015 – Kenya overcame Algeria 3-0 (25-14, 25-11, 25-11) on the eighth day of the FIVB World Cup at Momotaro Arena in Okayama on Tuesday.
Kenya coach David Lungaho: Congratulations to Algeria. They have a very young team and are doing well. In that match, sometimes they played very well and I want to encourage them because they are playing at a high level with young players. For us, it was important to win. We’ve lost the last six matches and winning the first match in the World Cup is a big plus for us and it will give us motivation as we proceed to the next matches. We know we still have a chance of winning a few more matches and that’s our primary goal.
Kenya captain Brackcides Khadambi: Today was a good match for us because it was the first time we have won in this World Cup, so we’re very happy. I also want to congratulate Algeria. They are a young team and trying hard so I want to say good luck to them and keep on fighting.
Algeria coach Henni Abdelhalim: Congratulations to Kenya. I think we can’t compare their preparation with ours. I think they didn’t stop between camps and competition for six months. We’ve only had one month with our B team. We know Kenya have a good serve and they used it today and it was very difficult for us. Our reception was bad today. Compared to yesterday’s game, yesterday was good and today was bad. Kenya aren’t participating in the African Games while Algeria is preparing a team for the future and we need to let all the players play in the two competitions. Next, we will look forward to qualifiers for the Olympics, so I hope that between the two teams we can get one to represent our country. For now, we just need one thing: experience, only experience. In reality, we needed six or eight months to prepare this team.
Algeria captain Silya Magnana: I thought we could do better today but really we took nothing positive from this match. But the competition in Japan is a good thing for us for the future. It’s hard to prepare for this tournament in only one month. We need more experience and we can use what we’ve learned in the matches here.