The national under-17 team yesterday beat Ghana 2-0 at the Moi International Sports Centre, Kasarani in the first leg, first round qualifying match for the 2003 Africa Under-17 Championships.

The Ghanaians were rocked by two quick goals by George Odari and Nicodemus Anunda and were lucky to not have gone down by a bigger margin.

The Ghanaians, however, accused Kenya of cheating, claiming the Kenyan players were overage.

Tom Olaba, the Kenyan coach, disappointed journalists when he disappeared into his room at the Kasarani hostel without giving an interview.

The Ghanaian coach Silas Tetteh said his team was superior tactically. "The stronger, bigger and more muscular team won," he said.

The contest started on the touchline as the players lined up for the national anthems before kick off. The Ghanaians broke into song and dance and their hosts responded in kind.

Kenya went into attack right from kick-off with Hassan Aden testing Blanso Kotei in Ghana's goal in the third minute. Nine minutes later, the Panpaper midfielder left the visitors dazzled with a 360 degrees spin in the box, but his cross was picked up by Kotei.

Ghana slowly came back into the game and in the 21st minute, Shaibu Yakubu controlled the ball in the box but Isaac Odhiambo was alert to the danger and kicked the ball away for the first corner of the match.

Hillary Omondi scraped the paint off the crossbar with a free kick in the 35th minute as Odhiambo came forward on Kenya's second corner to see his header just go wide three minutes later.

Then came the opening goal in the 40th minute. Anunda controlled captain MacDonald Mariga's ball from midfield and flicked it over his head to Odari who chested it down and banged it in to a rapturous applause from the sparse crowd.

Five minutes later, George Karanja won a lose ball on the edge of the box and squeezed it through to Anunda, who beat Kotei with hard shot and give Kenya a comfortable 2-0 at the break.

Kenya blew scoring chances in the second half as Omondi grazed the crossbar twice while Joseph Waweru, who had come in for Karanja, shot wide after beating the entire Ghana defence including the goalkeeper.

The visitors pressed for a the priceless away goal, forcing three corners late in the match.