Baraka Ominde will spearhead Kenya's challenge for the International Tennis Federation (ITF) Under-12 Championship in Kampala, Uganda next week.
Ominde will have the company of Brian Nyakundi and Zayan Zirani in the boys' category while Stacy Yego, Selien Ahoya and Tanisha Moshi will fly the country's flag in the girls' category.
Joseph Karanja and Raymond Kipruto will handle the six-man team. Team Kenya will be up against players from Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, Sudan, Seychelles and Comoros.
Ominde is confident his team will make the country proud in the week-long tournament. “We have a had a productive training session for the past couple of weeks and we are looking to meeting the top players from the region. We hope to compete and bring the medals home,” he added.
Ominde expects stern competition from Rwanda and Burundi players during the championship.
"The players from both countries are good and we expect them to offer formidable competition and we must be at our best," added Ominde
Ominde said they have trained at the Nairobi Club's murram surface which is what they are going to expect in Kampala. The team departs on Friday for the event.
Elsewhere, Kenyan tennis players had poor performances in the Egypt Futures tournament in Cairo.
The country's top-ranked player Ismael Changawa failed to make past the first round, losing 6-4, 6-3 to Simeone Vaccari of Italy.
Albert Njogu, Sheil Kotecha and Kevin Cheruiyot failed to make it past the qualifying rounds. The team was using the tournament as a build-up for the Davis Cup playoff showdown between Kenya and Indonesia next week in Jakarta.
The team will fly from Egypt straight to Indonesia and will arrive early to acclimatize to the hot and humid conditions.
Head coach Rosemary Owino said despite the mixed results in Cairo, she was optimistic of a good showing against the higher-ranked Indonesia.
