Harambee Stars captain ‘hurting’ after narrow loss to Estonia

NAIROBI, Kenya, March 29, 2026 – Harambee Stars skipper Aboud Omar believes they could have beaten Estonia in the semi-finals of the Fifa Global Series friendly in Kigali on Friday.

The Kenya Police right-back says it hurt for them to lose a match in which they enjoyed a lion’s share of the possession.

“It’s painful because we believe that we could have won very easily, but at the end of the day, you know, it’s 50-50, it’s a penalty (post-match penalties). We’re going to see what we’re going to do for the next game so that we can be victorious,” Omar said.

Coach Benni McCarthy’s charges fell behind to Tanil Tammik’s header in the 20th minute but then recovered through Ryan Ogam’s leveller in the second half.

Stars gave a good account of themselves, pinning the Europeans in their own half for much of the game, and even carving out a number of goalscoring chances.

However, it was the Estonians laughing last — and best — after edging out the East Africans 5-4 on post-match penalties.

Reflecting on the game, Omar admits they were all at sea in the first half but brought their A-game come the second 45.

“As you can see, in the first half we struggled a little bit to understand our opponent, how they play, and then we analysed them in the second half. We came strong, we equalised, we had a good game and unfortunately we didn’t convert all of our chances,” the skipper said.

He further attributed the lacklustre first half show to a lack of coordination within the players considering a number of them were making their bow.

“We have some new players, you know, it’s a bit difficult because we don’t know how they play or even how I play. The coach is preparing for all of us because we have a big task in 2027, so I think it’s  bit difficult, but at the end of the day, as I said, we had a bit of a problem to analyse how they are playing, but after we knew how they are playing, we came in and we converted and came back strong,” Omar observed.

Harambee Stars have another chance at redemption when they face Grenada in the third-place playoff at the same venue on Monday evening.

Estonia, meanwhile, tackle hosts Rwanda in the final, later on.

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