One Hurdle at a Time: Adhiambo’s steady rise to the top
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Reading Time: 7min | Tue. 19.03.24. | 19:01
‘’The fact that I still get a mention whenever players are called to the national team is encouraging. My best years are still ahead and I have no doubt that a chance will open up soon for me to represent my country."
A new generation set for future dominance of women’s hockey in the country seems to already be in the making at Blazers hockey club, record Kenyan champions and continental giants in the sport.
It may not look an immediate endeavour given a majority of the team’s core, and long-serving members still hold the unit like glue, but Blazers don't want to take any chances with the club’s reputation as the country’s go-to ladies on matters hockey.
Charlene Adhiambo is the latest addition to the champions’ squad that already overflows with overwhelming talent. She, like many others before her, joins the team battle-hardened and ready. But there’s more to her path towards the top.
Born and raised in Kisumu, the 22 year old first got hold of the hockey stick at Kisumu Girls high school, after unsuccessfully trying out with the basketball team earlier. Her basketball shots, she says, couldn’t even touch the rim.
‘’We all had to try out a sport, we were told, as part of the form one orientation. So I went straight to basketball and it was clear that I was not cut out for it. On my way back to the dormitory, I passed by the hockey pitch and said why not try here. That was it,’’ says Adhiambo who would later earn her first captaincy duties at the school.
There were five or six of them joining the school team but only Debra Ochieng (currently playing for Lakers Hockey) and herself stayed unbowed throughout the four gruelling years. The two would reunite at Lakers after high school and earn their premiership debuts here. Leadership came naturally to her, and leaving behind a team that could carry on their trailblazing tradition was top of her agenda.
‘’During my time we always came in third at the Nyanza regional games. Nyamira and Sinyolo girls were the better teams and however much we tried we just could never break that third-place jinx. When I finished, however, the team that came after us made it to second position, I was very proud as a former captain,’’ continues the midfielder.
Kisumu City is known for its rich hockey heritage, be it club-wise or schools. Kisumu Boys and Kisumu Day schools’ history in the sport speaks volumes of the city’s love for hockey. From these two, strong clubs have sprung up in the past, and players good enough for the national team moulded here.
The women’s game, despite the limited facilities in the city, gradually tagged along and a milestone was achieved with the formation of Kisumu Lakers Hockey Club a few years ago, the first of its kind.
A safe haven for the ladies was thus provided for girls who otherwise had no where to train, or play competitively. Ashley Akinyi, a founding captain for the side, saw it fit to start recruiting from the high schools within. Kisumu Girls high school was just across the road from where Lakers trained.
Charlene began her training with the side way before she completed high school. It was a win-win situation for herself and the club.
‘’Training with Lakers during holidays improved my game as these were people who already played in the league. For the club, this assured its management that the future of the team was safe as they would rope us in immediately after school,’’ Adhiambo offers.
‘’I got my debut with the Lakers barely months after finishing school and it was an away game against Strathmore, a very scary contest. The few minutes I garnered changed me for the better.
For starters, I had never played on astro-turf, so aside from the level being high, you have to quickly acclimate to the new surface. All my fellow debutants and I had known was playing on murram surfaces,’’ she laughs at her first day at the top level.
Upon returning to Kisumu, a surprise awaited her. Kamal Singh Sambi, at the time coaching record men champions Butali Sugar Warriors, had been a silent observer of Lakers training sessions at the simba Sports club and took note of Charlene’s abilities on the pitch- even noting that she didn’t have the proper hockey shoes. He would give her a new set, one that she admits to keeping to this date.
‘’I never expected that at all. He had been watching us train at Simba and one day he gifted me with a new set of hockey shoes. Turns out all the while I had been using non-standard shoes. I still have the pair to this date and that random act of kindness has never departed from my memory. It’s always motivating to know that someone’s taking note of your hard work,’’ says Charlene.
Lakers had given her the professional bow, but a long journey lay in wait for her. College called her back into the academic world.
Pwani University in Kilifi came as her next stop right after high school. More than 800 kilometres would tear her apart from her hometown, and to a large extent- her club Lakers. And herself just beginning to make a name in the hockey world, she instantly knew a transfer to a nearby club would be the best decision.
The management at Lakers offered its blessings for her move to Mombasa Sports Club (MSC), a tier below- but still worth it. All she wanted was to continue playing.
''MSC played in the Super League, and had its training and home matches in Mombasa. I had to make the commute from Kilifi every weekend to join the team for matches. During the weekdays, I trained with my own university side,’’ reveals Adhiambo, who just like before in high school, would be tasked with the varsity’s captaincy not long after joining.
The Bachelor of Arts (English & Linguistics) graduate, in her four years at Pwani, led the side to the Coast regional title four times, all while still putting in a hard shift at MSC, bagging the MVP award during the 2022/23 super league season.
Balancing these three areas; school work, school hockey and club hockey, she admits came with its challenges, but mainly from her responsibility as captain of the university team.
‘’There’s always a notion that the coast and having a good time go together. Personally I didn’t see it that way but some of my teammates did. Just having them get to the field for training was a tonne of work. All in all, I never shied from that task, it was my team after all and the few that made time for training experienced how sweet it was to win the regional titles,’’ continues Adhiambo whose first national team call-up came while at Pwani University.
The Kenya national team U21 coaches took notice of her relentless midfield display for MSC whenever the Mombasa side played its away matches in Nairobi and dully summoned Adhiambo for a try-out.
Luck, however, would not be on her side as the infamous COVID-19 pandemic occurred, in effect suspending all forms of sport worldwide. The positive spirit in her took this unfortunate disappointment in her stride and constantly earned future call-ups with the national team. A senior player now, she missed just by a whisker, the final Kenya squad that travelled to Ghana for the All Africa games.
‘’The fact that I still get a mention whenever players are called to the national team is encouraging. My best years are still ahead and I have no doubt that a chance will open up soon for me to represent my country,’’ adds Adhiambo, confident especially after aiding her new team Blazers to the Greensharks Memorial Tournament triumph over the weekend.
The move to Blazers was a long way coming, viewed in retrospect. All those national team call-ups, and camping, and training. Having themselves (Blazers) a huge chunk of players in the national fold, it was easy to spot this outsider who consistently made the list but was yet to play for a ‘top’ team.
The culmination of it would come when she helped MSC earn promotion into the Premier League last season so it seems she was going to play at the top regardless.
A huge leap of faith for her, the midfielder agrees. "I had to call my mother before making the decision," she confides.
They say the top of one mountain could very well be the bottom of another. Adhiambo joins a team whose portfolio supersedes many before it by a mile, a seemingly tall order- but if you have been through half of what her hockey journey thus far has offered her, you are as good as polished for the top tier.
And re-uniting with her former teammate at Lakers too, a national team regular defender Vivian Akoth, she’s in good company and should only worry about making the most of it as she lays the foundation for another feather to her cap.
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