Kiyovu’s Kanyankole shifts focus as title grip loosens

SPORTS Club Kiyovu Coach Gilbert ‘Yaoundé’ Kanyankole has shifted focus to garnering as many points as possible from the remaining 17 Turbo King National Football League matches as the team’s title grip loosens.After making a slow start to the 2013/14 season, Kiyovu have won five, drawn three and lost one of their nine league matches played so far to move into third position with 18 points, three adrift of the leaders AS Kigali and a further two behind second-placed APR FC.“We need to out as many points as possible in the remaining matches when the league returns on December 21 if we want to win the league because everyone wants (to win) the league title,” Kanyankole told Times Sport recently.The former Rayon Sports coach added, “At the moment I am not thinking about it (league title) but of course it is our main objective. If we want to win the league, we must first get as many points as possible.”With 27 points already played for, there is 51 more points to fight for until end of the season and Kanyankole believes the race for the title could go to the wire due to the competitive nature of this year’s campaign in which none of the usual contenders is yet to show enough consistency.Before joining Kiyovu Sports this season, the veteran tactician helped Burundi’s giants Vital’O to win this year’s regional Cecafa Kagame Cup club championships in Darfur, Sudan at the expense of Rwanda’s APR.The Mumena-based Green Baggies’ next league fixture will be against record 13-times Rwandan champions APR on December 21.Kiyovu, the oldest football club in Rwanda, has not won a major silverware since 1993 but Kanyankole, probably the most experienced coach in the league, is hopeful he could be the man to end the 21-year long drought.