LAHORE-Pakistan volleyball senior men team Friday thrashed Chinese Taipei volleyball team 3-0 in Almaty, Kazakhstan in FIVB World Challenger Cup Qualification Continental Tournament.
According to Pakistan Volleyball Federation (PVF) secretary general Shah Naeem Zafar, Pakistan had lost to China Taipei in the last Asian Senior Men Championship at Surabaya, Indonesia as China Taipei was placed fourth in Asia in that tournament. It had defeated the strong teams of South Korea and Iran in Asian Championship. But this time, green shirts played superbly and outclassed them by 3-0, with a score of 25-22, 26-24, 25-19. Pakistan will now play against Kazakhstan today (Saturday). Pakistan team played like a unit and did great job both in attack and defense. Aimal Khan, Murad Jehan and Mubashar Raza did powerful attack with quick spiking. Mubashar Raza and libero Nasir proved a rock solid wall for their opponents. Aimal Khan, Mubashar Raza and Sheraz served excellent and disturbed reception of the ball by Chinese Taipei and as a result, succeeded in blocking opponents attack effectively.
In fact, Pakistan coach Hamid Movahedi developed a good strategy by analysing the play of Chinese Taipei by watching previous videos of their play and prepared the team to counter opponents’ tactics convincingly. He had worked hard with Pakistan's senior volleyball team for the last three months. The team's visit to Turkey also paid off as the team was sent to Turkey on its way to Kazakhstan, where it played three matches with Turkish senior team and gained great match experience.
Now the scenario is that if Pakistan team win this tournament, they will host another qualification tournament to be participated by 4/5 teams from South America. The final decision that which teams qualify for World challenger cup shall be decided after that.
Pakistan volleyball is now on the upward trajectory and 2018 will prove the year of change for it, for which PVF chairman Chaudhary Yaqoob has been striving and keen to achieve desired results.