Punjab men win youth national bronze; 6 players in camps

Chandigarh, May 20

Six players from the Punjab men’s team that won bronze at the youth volleyball Nationals recently have been selected for India camps in different age groups.

Punjab finished third at the Youth National Volleyball Championship, held in Maharashtra from May 9 to 15. Punjab defeated Haryana 3-1 (25-18 17-25 25-23 25-12) in the third-place match. They had defeated Tamil Nadu 3-1 (25-16 23-25 25-20 25-17) in the quarterfinals before going down in a thrilling five-setter against Rajasthan, losing 2-3 (23-25 21-25 25-18 25-17 14-16).

It was Punjab’s first medal at the event since they won back-to-back bronze medals in the 2015 and 2016 editions.

Of the medal-winning team, Manmeet Singh has been included in the senior national camp, while Preet Karan Singh, Dheeraj Bhatia, Samar Sharma and Jasjodh Singh have been called up for the U-23 camp. Simonjit Singh has been included in the U-20 camp. The other members of the Punjab team were Baljit Singh, Akashdeep Singh, Gagan Preet Singh, Jagseer Singh, Manjinder Singh and Kuldeep Singh.

“With the team we had it was disappointing we didn’t get to the final,” said Gurjot Singh, a former India player and coach at the Punjab Institute of Sports (PIS) centre in Ludhiana. “But it’s a big medal coming after a long time,” he added.

The team’s training camp was organised at the PIS centre in Ludhiana. Six of the players — Akashdeep, Baljit, Bhatia, Preet Karan, Jasjodh and Simonjit — are trainees of the PIS centre at Mohali. “The loss to Rajasthan would have been tough to get over but the team deserves credit for bouncing back to win bronze,” said Sapinderpal Singh, coach at the Mohali centre.