With defending champion Emmanuel Korir having failed to make it beyond the heats, Kenyan hopes will lie on the 18-year old 2021 World Under-2o champion, whose coach is 2007 World Champion Janeth Jepkosgei.
In his semi, Wanyonyi retained his front running tactics, and won in a time of 1:43.83, which also ranked as the fastest time across the three semi-final streams.
In the second semi, Ng’eno could not continue his good form off the heats and came eighth in a time of 1:45.56.
Making the rest of the seven lanes in the final is Canadian marco Arop, Algerians Djamel Sedjati and Slimane Moula, Botswana’s Tshepiso Masalela, Ben Pattison of Great Britain, Adrien Ben of Spain and USA’s Bryce Hoppel.
Meanwhile in the men’s 5,000m, Kenya’s representation will be two out of the four that entered Friday night’s semi-finals. Only Jacob Krop and Ishamel Kipkurui narrowly managed to get through as Cornelius Kemboi and Nicholas Kimeli failed to progress.
Kimeli seemed to have been nursing the hangovers of a brutal 10,000m race two days ago where he finished fourth, and didn’t have the legs to carry him through the last two laps of the 5,000m.
He had looked to be okay most of the race, but when the pace was injected with four laps to go, he couldn’t sustain for long.
Kimeli finished 14th in 13:40.43 while Kemboi was a further 17th in 13:44.32. The race was won by Spain’s Mohamed Katir while Norway’s defending champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen, who finished second in the 1500m on Wednesday was third, and also made the final.
In the second semi, Krop, silver medalist from Eugene last year behind Ingebrigtsen, narrowly managed to secure one of the eight automatic qualification slots alongside Kipkurui as they finished seventh and eighth.
The two crossed the finish line together and timed a similar 13:33.63.
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