The 2021 Charles Matoke football tournament came to an end on Sunday evening December 19th at the Nyanturago playing ground, Nyaribari in Kisii County.
The tournament attracted large crowds bearing in mind that the Kisii region is the backbone of the country's football talents having produced many legendary players.
The main objective of the tournament was to use sports to empower the community by identifying, nurturing and exposing raw local talent to the world. The other objective was to market Kisii county and open it to the world as a sporting destination through sports tourism according to the founder and brains behind the Charles Matoke tournament.
It is not rare that each political campaigning period football tournaments are organised around the country. Most of them have political undertones, with several politicians being accused of exploiting the rural folk with a tournament where the winners are given balls and poor-quality soccer jerseys (according to some fans) branded with the politician’s name in exchange for free publicity. The tournaments have been used by some of them as a brand and marketing tool for their own selfish gains
Most tournaments are held for political reasons and not sporting. Hence, they don’t have any positive effect on the sporting side of Kenyan football.
A Football Kenya Federation (FKF) official who spoke on condition of anonymity, and because he is not the official spokesperson of FKF confirmed that any tournament in the country needs authorization from FKF.
Reason being that most participating clubs in the tournaments are either affiliated to FKF or participating in FKF Leagues. If not, they mainly draw their players and technical bench mostly from affiliated teams.
Case in point was the Charles Matoke Tournament finals where the finalists, Ichuni FC and Small Simba FC from South Mugirango drew a number of their players from Zoo Kericho FC, Bidco United fc, Silibwet FC, Posta Rangers FC that features in the National Super League and Kenya Premier League .
"We take this opportunity to thank Charles Matoke for successfully organising a football tournament in the Kisii county even though it had some few challenges," local organisers commended.