Reviewed by Peris WambuKenya sports betting writer
Published 11 September 2026 · Updated 24 September 2026
Football Kenya Federation has set Saturday 19 September as the start of the 2026/27 SportPesa Premier League, citing a Murang’a High Court ruling of 28 August, and has said the season will be run under the 2019 regulations rather than the 2025 ones.
Update, 20 September 2026: the season did not start on 19 September. Football Kenya Federation called the opening round off hours beforehand and postponed the league until further notice, after the High Court at Murang’a barred it from starting until a playoff is played between Kariobangi Sharks and Mombasa United and the High Court at Kiambu ordered Mombasa United to be included as an eighteenth club. There is more in Courts Leave Kenya’s Premier League Without a Start Date.
Update, 24 September 2026: Football Kenya Federation has agreed a playoff between Kariobangi Sharks and Mombasa United, in Mombasa on 1 October and in Nairobi on 6 October, to complete an eighteen club league.
It is the first firm date since the league was stopped, and it comes three weeks after the campaign was first supposed to begin. The opening weekend of 29 August did not happen, the replacement round set for 31 August to 2 September was postponed as well, and court orders arising from Kariobangi Sharks’ challenge to their relegation froze league activity in between.
The rulebook is the part that matters
The season will run on the 2019 FKF rules. That is the substance of the dispute rather than a technicality. The 2025 regulations raised automatic relegation from two clubs to three and removed the playoff, and it was relegation under those rules that Sharks went to court over.
Going back to the 2019 framework revives the playoff between the sixteenth placed club and the third placed National Super League side, so the final place in the division still has to be decided. It does not close the wider case. Directions on whether appeals against Sports Disputes Tribunal decisions belong at the Court of Arbitration for Sport rather than in a Kenyan court were set for 21 September, two days after the season was due to start.
What it changes for a Kenyan bettor
The local card was due to come back. Weekly jackpots in this market are built around Kenyan fixtures, and for three weeks there have been none to build on, which pushed both the jackpots and the accumulators onto foreign leagues.
Treat the first round with more care than a normal opening weekend. Clubs have had a stop start preseason and form lines from last season are a poor guide to a squad that has been training without fixtures. Pulse Sports reported that the delay was eroding match fitness before Kenya’s continental assignments, and that is the thing the prices will not show.
Opening fixtures are not listed here. The lists already published belong to the two rounds that were called off, and AXN Sports will carry the opening pairings once the federation issues them.
Where to bet: FKF Premier League markets reopen on SportPesa and Betika, both licensed in Kenya, where the Gambling Regulatory Authority took over from the Betting Control and Licensing Board in 2025. Prices are in KES on match result, both teams to score and total goals, alongside the weekly jackpots built around the local card, and both books fund by M-Pesa. With one fixture list already cancelled twice, read each operator’s postponement and void rules before you stake on a Kenyan match. Our guide to the best betting sites in Kenya covers withdrawal times and licensing, and there is more in Kenya soccer news from AXN Sports. 18+. Gamble responsibly.
