•Homabay put up a scintillating display of tiki-taka football that dazzled their opponents and left them chasing the wind.
Cecil Miller was the toast of the day, opening the floodgates with two quick-fire goals in the 18th and 20th minutes.
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Homabay head coach George Ouma has warned his charges against squandering glaring goal-scoring opportunities if they intend to storm the Talanta Hela Under-19 national football title.
The gaffer spoke moments after he led his charges to a resounding 7-0 win over Garissa at Kasarani Annex to book a quarterfinal berth.
“It feels good to win today’s match but I’m still devastated about our heavy loss in our first match against Vihiga. We created a lot of chances and we shouldn’t have lost the game but it happened,” Ouma remarked.
“My worry is that we play easy but we are unable to bury the chances we get. We seem to struggle when we get to the final third. For example, today’s game was just terrible because we missed close to 20 chances,” he added.
Homabay put up a scintillating display of tiki-taka football that dazzled their opponents and left them chasing the wind. A flurry of Incessant inroads into the Garissa territory soon yielded a feast of goals for the talent-laden Nyanza-based side.
Cecil Miller was the toast of the day, opening the floodgates with two quick-fire goals in the 18th and 20th minutes.
Ben Ogutu then pounced on a loose ball on the edge of the area to stretch the lead further two minutes after the restart.
Geoffrey Omondi, Moses Omondi, Markvivan Kesa, and Onyango Kenyatta later scored a goal apiece to pile more misery on the hapless Garissa county team.
In another action-packed encounter at Kasarani Annex, West Pokot thrashed Kirinyaga 4-1 to punch a ticket to the quarterfinals
An elated West Pokot head coach Yonah Wasike lauded his charges for exhibiting unmatched prowess in the crucial encounter.
“The match was tough. Those who watched from the stands may have thought it was an easy game judging by the score-line. I did all I could to psyche the boys up until they were able to settle down and contain the opponents,” Wasike remarked.
“We are preparing to play either Homabay or Vihiga in the quarterfinals because we don’t have any results from the group just yet. However, we are prepared to meet whoever we are paired with and we are not scared of any team,” he added.
“People have long profiled us as cattle rustlers but we have now abandoned that activity to fully concentrate on football. We can now be rightfully referred to as football rustlers,” Wasike stated.
“It’s very unfortunate we’ve bowed out of the tournament after losing today’s match which was a must-win for us. We live to fight another day.
Mombasa thrashed Marsabit 5-0 at the same venue to also advance to the quarterfinals with Tyson Kahindi netting a brace and Abdallah Abdulhafidh, Rhowa Issa, and Khamis Bakari scoring a goal apiece to seal the victory.