Season heating up as association enters third round of matches

THE Nese Koupa Volleyball Association in Hanuabada village entered its third round of matches on Saturday with the 2021 season heating up.
Association president Ako Udu told The National that the new season would see up to 20 weekends of competition for the men’s and women’s divisions.
“We’ve completed our third round of competition and we’re still getting our numbers together and sorting out the teams for the main village games,” he said.
“But for now, we’re happy to be giving game time to our players.
“We normally have 10 teams but the situation with Covid-19 last year saw us run with only eight teams and despite that we still managed to run a full season.
“A big make-up of the teams taking part here are our youths and that’s been the emphasis behind competition since its inception in 2019 because these are young people who we want to see taking the lead.
“Apart from youths in the village, we’re also bringing teams from the surrounding communities to come and play, so that helps out a lot in networking and it’s shown when there’s trouble, we have young people working together and trying to solve a problem.”
Udu said it was still early in the season but executives of the association were working closely with clubs to ensure registration and compliance.
He urged teams and players to continue their preparations with matches in the upcoming rounds expected to be more competitive.