Breakdown of Watoto wengine wanapenda tenisi kuliko mpira wa miguu.
Questions & Answers about Watoto wengine wanapenda tenisi kuliko mpira wa miguu.
Wengine literally means other and agrees with watoto (children) in noun class (class 2 → wengine).
Depending on context, it can be understood as:
- other children (in contrast to some children already mentioned)
- e.g. Some children like football, *other children like tennis.*
- some children (not all children, just an unspecified subset)
In isolation, Watoto wengine wanapenda tenisi kuliko mpira wa miguu is normally taken as:
Some children like tennis more than football.
So wengine covers both ideas; English forces you to choose some or other, but Swahili does not always strictly separate them here.
The subject of the sentence is watoto (children), which is plural.
Swahili marks subject agreement on the verb:
- mtoto anapenda… = the child likes… (3rd person singular, a-)
- watoto wanapenda… = the children like… (3rd person plural, wa-)
So you must use wana- for they (children), not ana-.
Wanapenda = they like / they love.
Wanapenda has two parts before the verb root -penda (to like/love):
- wa- – 3rd person plural subject marker (they)
- -na- – present tense / present habitual marker
So wanapenda means they like / they usually like / they like (in general), not just at one single moment. It’s the normal way to talk about general preferences or habits.
Swahili often forms comparisons with kuliko without a separate word meaning more.
The pattern is:
Subject + verb + thing A + kuliko + thing B
and it means:
Subject + verb + thing A more than thing B
So:
- Watoto wengine wanapenda tenisi kuliko mpira wa miguu.
= Some children like tennis more than football.
You could think of kuliko as than (more than) all in one. There is no separate more written, but the comparative idea is built into the verb + kuliko structure.
Yes, you can say:
- Watoto wengine wanapenda tenisi zaidi ya mpira wa miguu.
This is also understood as:
- Some children like tennis more than football.
Subtle points:
- kuliko is a very common, straightforward way to say than in comparisons.
- zaidi ya literally adds more of / more than, so it can slightly emphasize the more.
- You can even combine them in some styles: zaidi kuliko, but kuliko alone is already good and natural here.
For everyday use, kuliko and zaidi ya are both fine in this sentence, with no big difference in meaning.
Literally:
- mpira – ball, rubber, a spherical ball-like object
- wa – of (possessive/associative marker)
- miguu – feet / legs (plural of mguu, foot/leg)
So mpira wa miguu = ball of feet → the sport played with your feet.
In everyday Swahili this means football / soccer.
Other similar sports names:
- mpira wa kikapu – basketball (ball of the basket)
- mpira wa wavu – volleyball (ball of the net)
You may also see soka used informally for football, but mpira wa miguu is the clear, descriptive phrase.
The little word wa / ya / la / cha / vya / za etc. in phrases like mpira wa miguu must agree with the first noun, not the second one.
Here:
- First noun: mpira – class 3/4 (m-/mi-)
- Class 3/4 uses wa as the possessive/associative marker
- So we get: mpira wa miguu (ball of feet), not mpira ya miguu
Even though miguu is plural, it does not control that word; mpira does.
That’s why it is wa miguu.
In the sport name mpira wa miguu, miguu is naturally plural because:
- The game is played using both feet (all players’ feet), so feet feels more natural than foot.
- As a fixed phrase, mpira wa miguu is the established expression for football / soccer.
Mpira wa mguu would literally mean ball of (the) foot, which sounds odd as the name of the sport. So for the sport, you should use the standard plural form miguu.
No. That order would be ungrammatical or at least very confusing.
The normal pattern is:
Subject + verb + first item + kuliko + second item
So here:
- Watoto wengine – subject
- wanapenda – verb
- tenisi – first item (the one they prefer)
- kuliko – than
- mpira wa miguu – second item (the one they like less)
You should keep kuliko directly before the thing being compared against (the less‑preferred item).
Just swap the positions of tenisi and mpira wa miguu:
- Watoto wengine wanapenda mpira wa miguu kuliko tenisi.
Meaning:
- Some/other children like football more than tennis.
The structure stays the same; only the two things being compared change places.
Wanapenda tenisi kuliko mpira wa miguu means:
- They like tennis more than football.
Swahili allows you to drop the full noun subject when it is clear from context, because the verb already carries the subject marker wa- (they).
So:
- With watoto wengine – we know explicitly it is some children.
- Without it – we just know it’s they, and who they are must come from the previous context.
All three can be translated as some children, but with slightly different nuances:
watoto wengine
- literally other children
- often implies a different subset from some children already mentioned
- can also just mean some (not all) children, especially when no earlier group is mentioned
baadhi ya watoto
- more literally a part of the children / some of the children
- a bit more neutral and explicit about being a subset of a larger group
watoto fulani
- certain children, some particular children (known or identifiable to the speaker, but not named)
- can imply specific but unnamed children
In your sentence, watoto wengine is very natural and idiomatic.
Wengine is pronounced roughly like: we-ngé-ne (3 syllables).
The ng here is like ng in English finger, not like ng in singer.
- So you pronounce the g sound: weng-
- It is we-ngi-ne, not we-ni-ne.
In Swahili spelling:
- ng (without an apostrophe) generally represents the ng sound with a g, as in finger.
- ng’ (with an apostrophe) represents ŋ without the g, as in singer.
Here we have wengine (no apostrophe), so you say the g.
In practice, tenisi in this sports sense behaves much like English tennis:
- It is usually treated as a mass/uncountable noun:
- Napenda tenisi. – I like tennis.
- You don’t normally make a plural like matenisi to mean tennis games in everyday speech.
If you need to be explicit about matches or games, you would typically add another noun:
- mchezo wa tenisi – a tennis game / match
- michezo ya tenisi – tennis games / matches
So in Watoto wengine wanapenda tenisi kuliko mpira wa miguu, tenisi is being used in this general, uncountable, sport-name sense.