·Manchester Marvels- new sitting volleyball team.

Manchester marvels is one of the new 5 sitting volleyball teams that have been supported by the VE Foundation. Let’s see why they decided to go for sitting volleyball?

Why did you apply for the funding, why did you want to add sitting volleyball to your volleyball offer? - Our Club's mission statement is to provide the opportunity for everyone to take part in volleyball and we felt as a committee that we weren't fulfilling this without delivering sitting volleyball. We had already started discussing how we could start a sitting volleyball project at the Club when the foundation announced the first round of funding; so naturally we jumped at the opportunity and were very excited when we were successful in our application.

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How did the Foundation grant help you to get established?

The grant allows our sitting volleyball sessions to have their own specialist equipment, giving a first class experience of the sport to those who have never tried or even seen it before. First impressions are very important and without the equipment provided by the foundation, we wouldn't look half as professional as we do now. The grant also allowed us to start our sitting volleyball sessions the moment restrictions were lifted; while the rest of our Club's volleyball activities were still taking place outside, Covid-19 safe equipment and sanitization packs allowed sitting volleyball to be the first activity to start back indoors at our Club.

How did you go about promoting the opportunity locally, who did you contact? What was the response?

We started by including sitting volleyball as part of our open membership; this means that all of our Club members can attend sitting volleyball sessions at no extra cost. We advertised this extensively within our Club and surveyed our members to gauge interest. We then advertised the sessions (both separately and as part of our membership) on our website and social media pages. With help from Volleyball England Foundation, we contacted local disability charities and organisations informing them of our sessions and promoting Sitting Volleyball in general. One of our members has taken on the responsibility of Sitting Volleyball Lead and continues to communicate with these organisations. He has plans for future promotion activities targeted at local colleges and universities, with the aim of bringing disabled athletes from those organisations together to play the sport. Responses to club and social media promotions have been very positive, local charities and organisations however are still cautious of the Covid-19 situation and have reported back to us that their members aren't currently comfortable taking part. Initial talks with the universities in Manchester have been exciting, they are keen to make use of our sitting volleyball equipment for their own sessions and our Sitting Lead is keen to then bring everyone together under one banner to guarantee numbers to enter competitions. This is something we are hoping to progress with over the off season.

What has been the most difficult/ challenging aspect?

It has been very challenging to engage and encourage local disability athletes to come and give the sport a try. We are finding that even though our goal is to provide volleyball opportunities for all, the majority of the people taking part at the moment were already involved in volleyball in some way. As with our other volleyball projects, it is difficult to engage people outside of the existing volleyball community.

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What has been the best part of the development?

Our sessions are combined with an open volleyball session on a Thursday evening and then at the same time as one of our men's teams on a Saturday, they share the sports hall. Right away, those who have joined just to play sitting volleyball commented on how great it was to feel part of the wider club and the way we run the open training, including everyone in the sitting volleyball, not just the standard volleyball (participants take part in sitting volleyball drills alongside our sitting players) guarantees good numbers every week and they always have enough people for a game.

What are your aspirations for the future?

We would like to engage with local colleges and universities to give young disabled athletes the opportunity to play a fantastic sport, with aspirations of forming a competitive grand prix team based at the Club.

Thanks and Good Luck to Manchester Marvels.

If you would like to set up a sitting volleyball section in your club, get in touch with the foundation on foundation@volleyballengland.org