Fleet-Footed Marion Serenge Named Among The Global Fastest By FIFA
Marion Serenge in action against Mexico. PHOTO/FKF
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic-Every football player’s dream in any given global showpiece is to leave a mark that will be remembered for a very long time.
The memory could be either in the form of shots, goals, saves, possession, free-kicks, taken corners, fair plays or any solid statistics that spar up the championship.
Kenyan forward Marion Serenge is the latest player gracing the global stats at the ongoing 2024 FIFA U17 Women’s World Cup in the Dominican Republic.
Serenge is among the top five fastest players since the tournament begun on October 16.
The world football governing body has pooled her together with the likes of Trinity Armstrong (USA), Noemi Camacho (Ecuador), Jane Oboavwoduo (England) and Lauryn Thompson (England).
Marion Serenge in action against Korea DPR. PHOTO/FKF
The feat makes Serenge the third Kenyan player to write history in the championship, after Lornah Faith who bagged the Player of the Match award against Mexico and Valarie Nekesa- who became the first Kenyan to score a goal in any given FIFA World Cup- both male and female.
While reacting to her new feat, Serenge who was lost for words said: ” Lord, your daughter is grateful. I feel really honoured with this award.”
Serenge’s social media pages were abuzz with congratulatory messages for gracing the global stats in the tournament.
“Wow. Congratulations. You deserved a goal to crown it. But this is the very first of the many accolades coming your way,” Dan Woud Ruoth wrote.
Socrates Lubale stated: ” Congrats Marion. I celebrate you as the first Kenyan player to achieve this feat.”
George Obambo, while encouraging her to work hard towards achieving her football success said: “Congratulations, never give up, continue doing more practice to excel in the sport.”
While giving secrets to their winning ways against Mexico that saw Kenya end the championship third place on three points, Serenge said they followed the instructions given by their coach which made their work easy on the field.
“We comfortably settled in the game without any pressure. We had great coordination in the pitch. We saw and located each other well to give out neat passes that resulted into the goals.”
In her general assessment of the championships, the Archbishop Njenga Girls High School student says the tournament was not easy despite stretching beyond their limits in the matches.
She believes their debut in the competition was an eye opener for the country and that Kenya will return to the football showdown bigger and better next season.
“We had high expectations, but it is what it is now despite giving our all.
“We applied all the tactical approaches and the skills learnt from our coaches and that’s where we could reach. I don’t think a third place finish in our first attempt is all that bad.
“As first timers, I can just say it was a good experience. We got the needed exposure and we learnt the lessons that will strengthen the team in the coming editions,” she underlined, adding that: “Most of the teams in this World Cup or rather the ones we played in our pool have all been in this championship for a long time hence their level of experience that we couldn’t match. But we have started to build those levels and they will be beneficial to the country in the future.”
Quarterfinals results
USA 2 0 Nigeria
North Korea 1 0 Poland
