Sad that Kenya misses out from World T20

For the second time in a world T20 tournament, the stunners in world cricket- Kenya are found missing from the world T20. Kenya last made their appearance in the inaugural edition of the same in 2007 when they were grouped with New Zealand and Sri Lanka. Kenya as expected missed out by losing to both the teams it was grouped with. Much to anyone's amazement, Kenya didn't even make it to the ICC Champions trophy played in South Africa last year. Of course, there were just 8 teams which participated in that trophy with even Bangladesh and Zimbabwe missing out.

If the statistics of the Kenyan team is given a close look at, they should have by now been awarded the test status similar to Bangladesh. Even Bangladesh doesn't deserve to play test cricket which is a different issue here. And, coming back to Kenya, they were the first non test playing nations to make the cricketing world stunned when they not only beat the West Indies in their inaugural world cup in 1996 but also were successful in getting the West Indian team that in a couple of weeks from then onwards made it to the semi finals of the same for a score less than 100.

In that edition, Kenya defeated the West Indian team which defeated South Africa for the first time in the quarter finals after South Africa were fresh from 5 consecutive wins against Pakistan, New Zealand and England in the league stages. In the world cup 1999 which was played in England after 16 years, though Kenya failed to win even a single match, they were seen crossing the 200 runs mark in 5 out of the six games that they played, with the 198 which they scored against Sri Lanka being the only exception. Kenya is the only non test playing team to have defeated India on two occasions.

The best from the Kenyans came in the 2003 world cup when they beat Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe which saw them become the first non test playing nation to make it to the semi finals of a world cup. Perhaps! Kenya were also the first non test playing nation to make it to the super sixes of a world in 2003. In the same edition of the world cup Kenya defeated three test playing nations in Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe and Bangladesh which is a unique record shared by Ireland when they did it in 2007 and if the word defeated is replaced by unbeaten. And, with such a Kenyan team failing to make it to the world T20 on two successive occasions is need a bad fortune for cricket lovers.