“We have confirmed our entry for the Asian Volleyball Championship.
“The event will help the country in preparation for the Asian Games,” the chairman of the Pakistan Volleyball Federation (PVF) Chaudhry Muhammad Yaqoob told ‘The News’ on Tuesday.
Kazakhstan will defend the title in the championship. Pakistan had claimed fourth position in the previous edition held in Islamabad in 2007.
Meanwhile, the national volleyball players resumed their training in Islamabad on Tuesday after a break of around ten days in connection with the preparations for the Asian Games to be held in China in November.
The volleyball players had to receive a massive jolt, when they were asked to stop their camp in the last week of June, as the discipline was not under consideration for the Asian Games.
The action of the authorities to stop volleyball camp also had prompted the National Standing Committee on sports to interfere in the matter and finally it was included in the list sports for the Asian Games.
“As per our information, volleyball has been included in the list for the Asian Games and its camp resumed in the federal capital on Tuesday,” Yaqoob said.
He said that all the players in the camp — under Brazillian coach — are young but are experienced, saying, it is the team which defeated Australia and Japan in the Asian Junior Championship — held in Iran in 2008 — where the country claimed a bronze medal. Iranian Ali Reza Moameri was the coach of that bronz medalist side.
He further said that the Central Asian Volleyball Championship in India in September and the Al-Rashid International Volleyball tournament to be hosted by Dubai from October 8-13 are the two big events which will help the team learn a lot ahead of the Asian Games.
To a question, Yaqoob said that the authorities should not have stopped the camp in the middle as it has broken the rhythm of the team.
“You can give one or two days of rest to the players during the camp but you cannot release them for an extended period, it breaks the momentum and now the players will be starting from zero,” he pointed out.
Meanwhile, the spokesman of the PVF said that spiker Kashif Mansoor will not be able to represent the side in the Central Asian Championship because of a knee injury.
Probables: Muhammad Usman, Zahid Bashir, Pir Bakhsh Yaseen, Asif Nadem, Mohib Rasool, Naeem Jan, Shuja Abbas, Imdad Hussain, Hafiz Muneer, Naseer Ahmed, Farooq Khan, Muhammad Ismail Khan, Nasir Khan,Aimal Khan, Abdul Razaq and Zaheer Abbas, Augusto Sabatini (coach), Faqeer Hussain (assistant coach).
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