Beach Volleyball loses World Champs spot

“I did a day by day program starting in January until the world champs including some tours which I knew would greatly benefit us and submitted this to the BVF and everyone knows but surprisingly that program was never followed. I have been pushing the players and even assisting them with funds to attend trainings— these players have never been on camp and we are talking about the number 1 ranked team in Africa,” disappointed Marumo added.

Marumo highlighted that the team has lost out on a good opportunity to showcase their talents at world stage.

“I am talking about top quality players, other countries envy these guys, we are so lucky to have them and it’s sad that we find ourselves in this situation,” he said.

The vice president of Botswana Beach Volleyball, Batsho Ruth Mbangwa confirmed to BG Sport that indeed the team has not travelled to Morocco and owned up to the blunder of not being aware of the requirement set by World Beach Volleyball prior to high level competitions. “It is true, unfortunately beach volleyball is still new to us here in Botswana, we were not aware of certain basic requirements regarding the championships, we should compete in several competitions to maintain our rankings. Coaches had given us their program, had we managed to follow that program we could have not lost points. There is also lack of funds, we rely heavily on the Botswana National Sport Commission subventions, which is not enough, if we had enough funds we would have been able to follow the program of the coaches,” Mbangwa stated.

She further stated that they did try to get sponsor but their efforts did not bear fruits with companies indicating that they are still recovering from the effects of the global pandemic, COVID- 19. Marumo however shared that they will not give up as they eye qualification to the Paris Olympics next year. He said that they continue to train.