Bahrain junior spikers depart for West Asian championship

TDT | Manama                                                

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Bahrain’s junior national volleyball team have departed for Qatif, Saudi Arabia to participate in this year’s West Asian Junior Volleyball Championship, which is scheduled to get underway tomorrow. The competition is set to feature 10 nations who have been divided into two groups of five for the preliminary round.

The nationals are alongside their counterparts from Lebanon, the UAE, Jordan and Iraq, while Group B consists of Qatar, Kuwait, Syria, Palestine and hosts Saudi. Bahrain begin their tournament campaign tomorrow against the Iraqis in a game scheduled to begin at 1.30pm. The juniors are coached by Tunisian tactician Saber Abdulwahed.

They have a 12-player squad for the tournament, including Hussain Ali, Redha Matrook, Ali Al Bosta, Hassan Al Warqa, Sayed Hashem Issa, Ali Hussain, Ali Habib, Sadeq Marhoon, Sayed Ahmed Murtadha, Hussain Abdulredha, Hassan Aliwi and Abbas Ihsan.

Prior to their departure, the junior nationals were visited by Bahrain Volleyball Association (BVA) secretary general Feras Al Helwachi and a number of other BVA officials. Al Helwachi conveyed to them the greetings of BVA president Shaikh Ali bin Mohammed Al Khalifa and wished them success in the competition.

The Bahrainis are using the West Asian tournament to prepare for the 21st Asian Men’s U20 Volleyball Championship, which will be held in the Kingdom next month. Bahrain are in Pool A for the 18-nation continental showcase alongside Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia.

Pool B features Iran, Japan and India; Pool C includes South Korea, Qatar and Kuwait; Pool D consists of Thailand, Kazakhstan and the UAE; Pool E features Iraq, Australia and Bangladesh and Pool F comprises China, Taipei and Pakistan.

This year’s Asian under-20 event will be the third time Bahrain is hosting. The Kingdom previously also staged the tournament in 2014 and 2018. In the last edition in 2018, the Bahrainis almost made it to the quarter-finals, but suffered a heartbreaking five-set loss to Australia in the Round of 16.