Ryan Oosthuizen, who was playing without a number after forgetting his match jersey at the team hotel opened the scoring the second minute of the match with a try, but Justin was unable to convert from close to the touchline.

Sloppy defence saw the massive Alvin Otieno shrug off tackles by Chris Dry, Zain Davids and Oosthuizen to stroll in for a try under the posts to hand the team from East Africa the lead.

With less than a minute left on the clock in the first half, a neat kick behind the defenders caught the Blitzboks napping, and Vincent Onyala collected the ball with one hand to go over the tryline with Rosko Specman clinging to his back.

This saw Paul Feeny’s Kenya take a solid 12-5 lead into the break.

The Blitzboks used their one minute half time break well to refocus and this paid off a mere minute into the second stanza when Specman danced past a couple of tackles to dot down under the posts for a converted try to level matters.

Chris Dry nearly scored the Blitzboks third try as he took as least two Kenya defenders over the line with him, however, the ball was held up in the tackle.

The resulting five-metre scrum was the perfect platform for the Blitzboks to strike, and they did exactly that when the returning Seabelo Senatla went over in the right corner for the match-winning try and also his 225th five-pointer on the HSBC Sevens World Series.

Kenya still had time to level matters or earn a late win, and for the first time in the game the Blitzboks defence looked organised and the pressure from the defenders led to a slight knock on which brought an end to the game and resulted in a victory for the worlds’ fourth-ranked time.

Post-match the Blitzboks captain, Siviwe Soyizwapi, conceded that as a team they were perhaps too overeager at times.

“I think that the boys came out today a little overeager and we didn’t quite get the flow that we wanted, but we are happy with the win.

“We enjoy playing here but we just need to get back to our basics and work on the processes that we practiced during the preseason.”

The skipper once again made mention they are inspired by the Springboks performance in Japan earlier in the year when they won the Rugby World Cup for the third time.

“With the Springboks coming back home from Japan with a win at the Rugby World Cup it was a massive motivation and inspiration for us, especially seeing that we are starting our season.

“The nation is happy, we are proud of the boys and we are just looking forward to the season that lies ahead.”

In the first Pool D game, England made light work of beating Spain 36-7.

The Blitzboks will tackle the Spanish at 11:48 on Friday, and the English at 17:54.

@MorganPiek OFM Sport