T&T senior women's volleyball team will come up against Himeji Victorina in their first warm-up match at the Himeji Victorina Volleyball Arena in Japan today as they fine-tune preparations for the start of the 24-team FIVB Women’s Championship next week.
The Renele Forde-captained "Calypso Spikers", the eight-time reigning champions of the Caribbean Zonal Volleyball Association (CAZOVA), will continue to train and play warm-up matches at the same venue under the guidance of head coach, Cuban-born Francisco "Panchee" Cruz until Thursday as they are also being hosted by the Himeji Victorina Pro Volleyball Club.
Yesterday, following their 20-hour journey to Osaka Bay, the T&T women's team, technical staff and T&T Volleyball Federation officials, president Nicole Selvon and vice-president Vaughn Martin started their preparations for their six-team Pool C round-robin series with an amazing welcome reception from the Youth Volleyball programmes ran by the Himeji Volleyball Academy.
Coach Cruz and his full complement of 12 players had a smooth morning training session and the state of the art sporting facility.
Speaking after the training session, Cruz who is expected to step down from the national team coaching position at the end of the Championships after a very successful 12-years in charge said, “ I was happy with the session today (yesterday), everyone looked happy and enjoyed the first day."
When asked about his goals going into the Championships, Cruz who also qualified T&T to a debut showing at the FIVB World Grand Prix last year said: “All I want is the best performance from my team every single game. It’s our first World Championship and all the other teams have been here before so we have to enjoy the game and fight hard."
Following the training session, the national women's team and staff were then invited to the office of Mayor of Himeji, Toshikatsu Iwami who gave them a warm welcome.
Mayor Iwami spoke of the city major site-seeing stops that the T&T contingent must visit and expressed his happiness in having team T&T in his city and country, saying he hoped to one day to travel to our beautiful island.
As part of the welcome reception, the T&T team was treated to an evening of cultural events hosted at La Viena Hotel Himeji by Mayor Iwami and the president of the Himeji Volleyball Club, Akira Hashimoto.
It turned out to be a spectacular event the T&T players will never forget.
The highlight of the cultural show was a surprise to us all when they announced a steelpan side, the Yamaura Seichi and one Heart Steel Band who opened with a rendition of Calypso Rose's "Rum & Coca-Cola" which had the T&T players and staff dancing away to the sweet pan music.
This was followed by the playing of the T&T national anthem for which the players sang their hearts outs.
During his welcoming speech, Mayor Iwami congratulated the team on their achievement and wished them all the best at the event.
The president also wished success to T&T and hopes his professional club learns a lot from them in the week here training and playing against his team.
The president closed by thanking Team TTO and teaching them a few cheers to learn during games to sing along with the crowd, in closing the president spoke of the scrimmages to be held later in the week and invited all guest to be present in support of both teams.
When the FIVB World Championship serves off the "Calypso Spikers" ranked 34th in the world, will open their Pool C campaign against fifth-ranked Russia on September 29 followed by a clash with defending champion and world second-ranked USA on September 30.
Forde and her team-mates will then have a day off on October 1 before resuming round-robin play against 16th-ranked Thailand on October 2; 24th-ranked Azerbaijan on October 3, and a day later versus tenth ranked South Korea to close out group play at the 6,000 capacity seater Kobe Green Arena in Osaka Bay, Central Japan.