Beach Volleyballers leave for Thailand

BERNARD PERERA

Sri Lanka’s beach volleyballers comprising of two men’s teams and a women’s team will leave the island today to participate at the Khanom, Pathalung and Samila Asian Beach Volleyball Championship to be held in Thailand from April 4, 2009.

Twenty nine countries from the Asian region have confirmed their participation. Sri Lanka who fared well during the South Asian championships go out with lot of confidence in maintaining their standard, and also hope improve heavily by playing against Asian giants for this sport.

The Sri Lankan men’s teams comprise of Dhammika Silva and Pubudu Ekanayake (Air Force) and Mahesh Perera and Wasantha Ratnapala (Sri Lanka Navy), Thakshila Gunasinghe (Sri Lanka Ports Authority) and Sujeeva Wijesinghe (Ampara) compete in the women’s category.

Priyantha Jayakody accompanies the team as manager, while the coach for both teams will be Udaya Kumara.

The main sponsor for the sport, Mount Lavinia sponsors the team, and the management of the hotel sponsored the players for a residential coaching program at Bentota Beach Hotel before their departure.

Sri Lanka have made their presence in this championship for the last ten years and are hoping to make strong bid to be among the top three. The team has undergone training well and with their past experience gained by participating at international level should come out well says the President of the Sri Lanka Volleyball Federation Dilan Perera.