Coronavirus: Bitok wants CAVB to postpone Africa Club Championship

Malkia Strikers head coach Paul Bitok wants the African Volleyball Confederation (CAVB) to consider postponing the upcoming African Club Championships amid the outbreak of the novel coronavirus.

Following the Ministry of Sports’ decision to suspend all the foreign sporting assignments for a month as a precautionary measure, five Kenyan volleyball teams set to travel to Egypt next month, find themselves in disarray.

Bitok who doubles up as the KCB technical director has asked CAVB to cancel the two events because Kenya will be much disadvantaged should the event proceed as planned.

“The government’s decision is the best for the country because we also don’t want to risk our players. I urge CAVB to cancel or postpone the two events and reschedule them for later dates so that Kenyan teams are not locked out,” he said.

The women’s fiesta is scheduled for April 2 to 11 in Cairo while the men’s show will run a week later from April 14 to 22 in the same city.

Bronze medalists Kenya Pipeline, Kenya Volleyball Federation (KVF) league champions Kenya Prisons and KCB – are all lined up to represent the country in the women’s category while fourteen time KVF winners GSU and Kenya Prisons will fight for the men’s contest.

“We have invested heavily in terms of preparations. KCB were planning to travel to Turkey at the end of this month for a camp as part of our preparations and it will be very unfair for Kenya if the two championships go on without considerations,” he added.

The deadly virus which has plunged the global sporting calendar into confusion, has already affected the men’s and women’s national beach volleyball teams who failed to travel for their Olympic Games qualifiers assignments.

The women’s team dream of gracing the Games in Tokyo was shattered last week after the Government failed to clear the Sammy Mulinge coached team for Nigeria where the second phase of the qualification was held.

On Tuesday, the men’s team also suffered the same predicament after they failed to travel to Gambia.

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coronavirus Malkia Strikers Paul Bitok postpone CAVB African Club Championships

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