No time to waste as Wafalme Stars hit ground running

National men’s volleyball team, Wafalme Stars, have finally started their official non-residential training ahead of next month’s CAVB Africa Nations Championship.

Coach Gideon Tarus says all their programs are ready and with about three weeks of training, they are getting down to business immediately.

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“We have started this morning at 9AM and will do that until 1pm for the period we will be in non-residential training. For our first week, the focus is exclusively on defense.

We are working on our back court and blocks. Once we have perfected that we will move to something different,” Tarus revealed as he led the team in their first training.

A team of 21 was named on 20 July with preparations expected to serve off soon after; but the wait has stretched to close to three weeks. Regardless, coach Tarus and his technical bench have everyone in camp.

“We have 20 players in camp. The only exception is Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) Bernard Wechuli who is tied up with military training. We knew there was a likelihood he might be unavailable while we were naming the team hence the decision to have 21 in our list while only 20 were required. That way, his absence will not affect our plans,” the head coach told Mozzart Sport.

Tarus further admitted that having all the squad members available from the first day is a blessing to his technical bench as they get to run the program effectively, without disruption and everyone on the same page.

Wafalme Stars will be looking to improve on their ninth-place finish from 2021 when the competition was held in Rwanda with what has been touted as a better squad than the last.

In Rwanda, the team was pooled alongside Egypt, Morocco and Tanzania, gaining maximum points against fellow East Africans who did not play and beating Egypt 3-2 (19-25, 25-22, 25-20, 18-25, 15-12) in a historic victory.

Playing an already qualified Morocco in final group match, Kenya went down 3-1 (19-25, 25-22, 25-17, 25-21) to miss out on the quarters when Egypt beat fellow North Africans 3-1.

Tarus' charges beat Burkina Faso and Niger 3-0 and 3-1 in the classification matches to finish in ninth place.