After exactly eight years of public courting, Engin Firat, as per the view of many, had finally cracked the code. The magic word being – Bruce Kamau.Back in 2019, in a Daring Abroad interview, Kamau, now 28 and player for Australian A-League side Perth Glory, explained the reasoning behind him not honoring the call to play for Kenya, despite there being interest from the Football Kenya Federation since May 2016.In the sit-down Kamau, who had a year ago – in 2018 – instead chosen to play for the Australian U23 side in the Asian Cup, said: “It was a hard decision to choose Australia over Kenya, a country where I still have my roots and have a lot of pride for.“But opportunity-wise, for myself in football, I think Australia has currently better opportunities for me, to maximize my career and achieve some of the things I want to achieve.”Backed by deeper reasons: “Kenya is still struggling in sports and proper infrastructure is not yet in place,” Kamau was at liberty to carve his own path, but many didn’t draw him being in the Harambee Stars conversation in 2024.Carrying a special tag of excelling in the art of “convincing dual-citizenship players to the national team”, Firat was largely seen as the reason for the overdue change in heart by Kamau.Introducing Engin Firat’s latest Arsenal for Harambee Stars: Tobias Knost, Bruce Kamau, and Adam WilsonAnswering a question from the media on his secret sauce, the Turk said: “There is no secret. But the secret I will tell you for why everyone wants to come to play with us, is that we play good games against good teams, and everybody in the team is happy. We are like a family and everybody wants to come.”On the process leading up to Kamau’s call-up, he added: “I didn’t invite him first. He asked for it and it came from his side. There is no secret.”Another special reason, according to Firat, was that his team, for no fault of their own – he briefly spoke about having his salary delayed – had been galvanized by their “sacrifices”, providing an outlook that from the outside looked attractive.Still making sacrifices: Firat discloses delayed salaries“The last year has been very difficult for us, so many problems, but you’ll never see anyone talking about them and this makes us united with all the sacrifices and we are like a family so it is very difficult now at this moment to destroy this family and they are not affected if anyone is writing or saying something. “We don’t get affected, and this is the reason also the boys from outside are now ready to come to play.”In the latest squad announcement, Kamau will be joined by Tobias Knost (SV Verl) and Adam Wilson (Bradford City), all who are expected to make their Kenyan debuts having featured for European nations in the age-group setups.##NAJAVA_MECA_8118090##
