AUSSIE VOLLEYBALLERS FACE CHALLENGING OLYMPIC QUALIFIER

VOLLEYBALL: May 30, 2012: Australian men’s volleyball coach Jon Uriarte believes this week’s Olympic Qualification Tournament in Tokyo will be a challenging but evenly contested competition for his exciting group of young players.

The Australians, hoping for a place in their third Olympic Games after playing in Sydney 2000 and Athens 2004, will meet Venezuela in their opening round match tomorrow (12 Noon AEST).
 
They will then meet Puerto Rico, Iran, Serbia, Japan, Korea and China over the 10-day round robin tournament with the top ranked team and the best placed Asian team qualifying for the 12-team Olympic tournament.
 
“The draw looks good for us,” said Uriarte, the former Argentinean Olympic bronze medal player.
 
“Even if the whole tournament looks very even, Venezuela is not at its best at the moment so it is good to have them first up.
 
“It looks like a very even tournament for most of the teams who have had a very short preparation. The challenge is who will be able to manage what has been a difficult build up for most teams?

“Australia’s preparation has been quite a complicated process. The players came back from their club seasons in very different condition, some of them good and with more experience and confidence, others with some injuries or in bad technical condition.
 
“It has been a lot of work putting the team together in a very short period, both recovering the players physically but rebuilding the technical mechanisms at the same time.
 
“For a young team it has been quite a demanding mental process.”
 
Uriarte admitted his team showed some solid improvement on the last week of their recent European tour, especially in the four-game tournament against Holland (which ended 2-2) and pin-pointed the areas he will be looking to improve.
 
“We still may not be at the same level that we reached at the end of last season but the team still showed good improvement against the Dutch which was encouraging,” said Uriarte.

“We will be looking to improve our attack and service game – they are the key areas we must perform well in if we are to win.

“I believe it s going to be a challenging tournament for most of our young players but it is a wonderful opportunity to show their maturity and that they can perform in a tough tournament.”
 
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