Nepali team led by captain Kailash Dutta Bhatta and coach Kapil Kishor Shrestha are prepared to defeat the South Asian opponents and expect to qualify for the final. Sri Lanka and the Maldives are the other two participating teams. Top two teams will qualify for the final of the championship after the round robin league.
Nepal and Afghanistan are playing for the first time. "We are not aware of the strengths of Afghanistan but we hope we to beat them," said Nepali coach Shrestha. "Meanwhile, our team is inexperienced in the international level but several domestic tournaments last year have boosted our players´ confidence," he added.
Nepal is to take on Sri Lanka on Saturday and the Maldives on Sunday. "We have played only 33 international matches in the entire history of Nepali volleyball starting from the first ever international participation in 1976. On the other hand, Sri Lankan team includes a player who has played 47 international matches. We are behind Sri Lanka in terms of spike jump and block jump. Despite all these odds , we are prepared to prove our mettle," said Shrestha.
Meanwhile, Croatian coach of the Afghanistan team, Mario Stipkov, said that his team has been training for last three months and hopes to put up good show in Kathmandu. "I can´t discuss tactical things now. We will try our best to win the first match and hope it would be a fair game. Let the best team win the match," said Stipkov.
All stage set for championship
Host Nepal Volleyball Association (NVA) said that preparations for the championship has already been completed and the stage is all set for Friday. "Despite many challenges, we completed the preparation for championship," said NVA President Dan Bahadur Tamang. "Only challenge we still have is the financial aspect of the tournament. However, NVA is committed to making the event a huge success," he added.
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