The season started poorly for us, with Andy, Gary, Sean, Jorg, Fred, Craig and Robin leaving the club and Richard retiring. What was most unfortunate was that we were unsighted by a few of the departures and entered 2 teams, Aces and Bees in the Wiltshire Premier League and League 1 respectively and very quickly had to withdraw a team not long after the fixtures had been published.
Nevertheless, we gained Mohsen at the start of the season and Zafer and Tim halfway through. Their presence has energised the club.
We registered 20 players with the Wiltshire Volleyball Association, 13 effectively for the Mixed League, of which 12 played and 7 for the Ladies and Juniors, 2 of these players also played for the Mixed team.
The spread of fixtures was also unhelpful, as we found our feet, playing in 50% of the first 10 league matches. This needs to be addressed to the WVA.
Interestingly out of the 12 league matches appearances are as follows:
Michael 12
Dave 10
Mark 10
Mohsen 9
Irwin 8
James 8
Andrew 7
Igors 6
Tim 6
Zafer 6
Phil 5
Armands 1
Donna 1
Oriele 1
At present we only have enough players for one team. However the summer months playing at Lydiard should give us the chance to showcase volleyball in Swindon and we must take that opportunity. Our aim should be to grow the club back to 2 teams in the Wiltshire League.