*4 senior male teams qualify for quarter-finals, two female make spot
By: AUSTINE AGBO EMMANUEL, Kaduna
The Technical Director, Nigeria Volleyball Federation, Mr. Martin Melandie, has said that the ongoing President’s Beach Volleyball Championship in Kaduna State is targeted at harnessing young talents that would represent Nigeria in global competitions.
Melandie made this known in an exclusive interview with New Nigerian Newspapers yesterday, during the ongoing President Beach Volleyball Championship at the popular Ahmadu Bello Stadium in Kaduna.
According to him, the fourth edition of the beach volleyball game has thirty eight (38) participants jostling for gold, silver and diamond, stressing that the game will help them ascertained the performances of players at both the male and female categories for intercontinental championships coming up few months from now.
He said, “what is happening here is the annual President Beach Volleyball Championship. This is the fourth edition.
“We have both the male and female categories, under 17 boys and girls. So the championship is in two categories. We have a total number of 38 teams in this competition.
“The purpose of this championship is that, we want to be able to see the level of performance of our senior teams and prepare them ahead of the intercontinental championships that are coming within the year and for the junior teams too, we have African youths game coming up alongside other youth competitions that are coming up inter continentally. So this is an avenue for us to be able to select players for camping in preparation of the inter continental competitions.
“We have seen some good tactics particularly the junior ones that are coming up very strongly and by the time we invite them to camp we will be able to put some finishing touches on their techniques and they will be fine but the level of performance is very high.”
Also, speaking with our reporter, the Chairman, Nigeria Volleyball Referees Association (NVRA), Surveyor Samuel Timothy revealed that four groups in the senior men’s category, have qualified to the quarter finals, Group A, B, C and D.
He added that in the Female category, Nigeria Custom Service, (NCS) will be playing Kaduna State in Group A, while Adamawa will be taking Niger in Group B of the quarter finals.
Timothy stressed that, YMCA and Light House will be locking their horns in Group A male category, while Kada Stars and Nigeria Correctional Service, (NCS) will also be slugging it out in the male category Group B, with With Nile university and Niger in Group C, and Kaduna state and Nigeria Custom Service (NCS) will also test their strength in the Group D semi-finals
