Winning YOG is not the focus but an eye-opener

Coach Chakuma Ismail of the national beach volleyball team yesterday said participating in the 2014 Youth Olympics Games (YOG) would be an eye-opener for the team’s exposure.

Ismail said in an interview in Abuja that winning was not the focus because it was their first time qualifying for the game.

According to him, a debut in the Olympics will be an eye opener for the teams to be exposed to the new environment and the sand texture used in beach volleyball.

“This is a great achievement to the volleyball family for qualifying for the YOG. We qualified for the first time in the history of this country, which has shown the level of volleyball development in Nigeria.

“It is not the winning that matters in this first outing, rather the exposure, experience and to see the way and manner it’s being played by other nation because the depth of the sand will be different,” he said.

He said that with this recent development it had shown that the game of volleyball would bring glory to the country in the international scene.

Both Nigeria male and female teams qualified for the YOG after participating in the African qualifiers held in Accra, Ghana from April 10 to April 13. (NAN)