Marines head coach Janvier Kamanzi has said that he will retain the league title at least for the next two years.After failed attempts in 2005 and 2006, Marines were last Saturday crowned 2007 national league champions after ousting CSK A in the play-offs final.Playing under a ‘best of five’ format, the Gisenyi-based club rallied to a 3-0 series win after game scores of 75-61, 75-73 and 80-54 against CSK A.After the victory, Kamanzi said, “I won the league much easier than I thought and I don’t expect to face any stiff challenge for the next two years.“I have a relatively young side that plays as a team. We did not win the league because we had extremely outstanding and talented players but because the players played as a team,” Kamanzi noted. Kamanzi joined Marines at the start of this year’s league second round after a year in the dark following his departure from APR were he won the 2005 title as assistant to Cliff Owuor.At the time, Marines’ chances of qualifying for the play-offs looked very slim after first round defeats against defending champions APR and CSKA.However, Kamanzi revamped his side to finish the entire second round unbeaten. On top of registering easy wins over the Group underdogs Kigali Institute of Education (KIE), Kigali Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) and ISAE, Marines also registered vital wins over CSK A and APR to progress into the play-offs. And the former APR assistant coach hopes to beef up his squad with two anonymous players before the start of the 2008 season.Ends
