17-MAY-2013
2014 WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP: WOMEN
NATIONAL TEAM PREPARES TO ENTER HISTORY
 

Women National Team is set to depart to the Belgium city of Kortrijk (May 22), where it will compete in the 2014 World Championship Euro Qualifiers Pool C, from May 23-26.

The team coached by Fernando Luís and Filipe Lacerda will play Switzerland, Belgium and Northern Ireland, looking to enter history [Calendar]

Filipe Lacerda sets the goal:
“Our goal is simple: We will try to enter history, because women Volleyball urge success quickly. These players know that they need to conquer something to gain their own space in the sport, as always, it’s all about numbers. We’ll need to play to win, and there’s no room for failures. This roster is more consistent than the previous ones, by comparison.
Regarding the practice, in the first days they were a little slow, but now they are well adapted and the rhythm is now better. The true test will be carried at the competition where we’ll analyze how they cope with facing more experienced athletes.
Belgium and Switzerland are the stronger teams, but nevertheless we will stick to our game plan in order to have the upper hand in the scorer”.

Joana Resende is one of Portugal’s more experienced liberos.
“The time for workouts was short, but we have been training twice a day to recover. I don’t know Northern Ireland so well, but I’ve already played Belgium as Junior. It’s a team with a solid formation and we’re expecting to be strong. Switzerland also has the tradition of putting together good teams. We will be aggressive in the serve, defending and side-out. Defending and serve are the most important aspects in our game”.

Joana also has been training with the Beach Volleyball National Team.
I attended for 3 weeks at the Training Center for High Performance (CTARCP) managed by Francisco Fidalgo. I made a pause to integrate the Indoor National Team, I believe that I can conciliate both and hope for a good performance both indoor as outdoors”.

With a regular presence at the National Team workouts, both Indoors and Beach Volleyball, Joana Neto, 2010 Beach Volleyball U-18 European Vice Champion, doesn’t give much credit to the moments of stress before such an important competition.
“We practise in the last days as if it was the first day, devoting ourselves to work since the beginning and despite there is a little anxiety, we will go there with our heads held high, because we feel that we’re doing everything possible to be at the level of other teams. I’m very glad with the progress being done in trainings and I believe that if we stick to our game plan, if we are consistent and fulfill all the basics, we will be able to perform well and, who knows, being able to achieve good results.
The beach trainings are different but they had the purpose of maintaining my form. I like to play both indoors and outdoors, so I feel great and either of the National Teams, and therefore I can be at my best”... [Video: http://www.fpvoleibol.pt/video1.html or http://youtu.be/hooNjPbb5ic]

The National Team will play Switzerland National Team in the 2014 WC European Qualifying Pool C opening day, followed by the duels against Belgium (24) and Northern Ireland (26). [Schedule]

The Pool C, organised by Belgium will be supervised by Pierre Mulheims (Luxemburg), CEV Technical Delegate, while Marc Bloemhard (The Netherlands), Ute Fisher (Germany), Marcos Folgar Fraga (Spain), Nick Heckford (Engalnd) and Lars Rydland (Norway) will be the appointed referees.
Vitor Gonçalves (Portugal) will also be at Kortrijk as referee for the men’s event – Pool D (Belgium, Austria, Romania and Northern Ireland), which will take place simultaneous at this city.

The European Qualification 1st Round Pools are organised as follows:
Pool A (Herceg Novi, MON) – Croatia, Bosnia&Herzegovina, Montenegro and Macedonia
Pool B (Mogilev, BLR) – Israel, Belarus, Finland and Denmark
Pool C (Kortrijk, BEL) – Belgium, Portugal, Switzerland and Northern Ireland
Pool D (Lutsk, UKR)– Ukraine, Hungary, Albania and Moldova
Pool E (Poprad, SVK) – Slovakia, Greece, Austria and Liechtenstein
Pool F (Daugavpils, LAT) – Estonia, Iceland, Latvia and Lithuania
Pool G (Cospicua, MLT) – Luxemburg, Cyprus, S. Marino, Malta and Scotland

The pool winners qualify for the 3rd Round, to be played in January 2014, while the 2nd ranked
teams will play the 2nd Round, scheduled for October 2-6, 2013.

More info: www.cev.lu  / www.fivb.org