Chennai Spartans geared up to mount strong challenge

Chennai, Feb 1 (PTI): The Chennai Spartans team is geared up to mount a strong challenge in the inaugural Pro Volleyball League, which gets underway at Kochi on Saturday.

The captain Shelton Moses is upbeat about the team's prospects and said the target is to reach the playoffs first.

"We have a strong team put together with the right balance of experience and youth.

Our target is to make it to the playoffs so that we can take advantage of home support during the second leg in Chennai," he added.

The team boasts of players like Kapil Dev, G S Akhin, Naveen Raja Jacob and others, apart from Moses and foreigners like Ruslan Sorokins (Latvia) and Rudy Verhoeff (Canada).

The team is coached by M H Kumara, a FIVB Level-3 coach with M Ramesh as his assistant.

Meanwhile, Indian international player G S Akhin is looking forward to the League and said the team had a mix of experience and youth which could prove beneficial.

"I feel we have a good blend of both experience and upcoming talent and we have two good foreign players inRuslan Sorokins from Latvia and Rudy Verhoeff from Canada. Both of them are Olympians and will be key to our progress in the tournament."

Akhin, who hails from Kerala, said he would be happy to play in front of his home fans.

"It will be a privilege to play in front of the Kerala fans. But Tamil Nadu is the state from where my volleyball journey started," he added.

Akhin, a huge fan of India cricketer Mahendra Singh Dhoni, is optimistic about the league making an impact to the game in the country and bringing in professionalism.

Meanwhile, Uppiliappan Gopalan, head of branding and corporate communication, Chennai Spartans, said the team was well prepared for the inaugural PVL and had the right mix of experience and youth to shine.

"We have a blend of experience and youth. We have players like Kapil Dev and captain Moses.

We have foreign players-(Ruslan) Sorokins and Rudy Verhoeff, who are very experienced and good. International players will blend well with Indians, he said.

He also said that the PVL would provide a good platform for the young Indian players to learn from the foreign players in each franchise.

"PVL is a good platform for young Indian players.

Like in cricket where we have the Chennai Super Kings and in football the Chennaiyin FC, the Chennai Spartans will do well and make the city proud," he signed off