THE Jamaica Volleyball Association (JaVA) has submitted a letter of protest following a decision by the North, Central America and the Caribbean (NORCECA) Volleyball Confederation to use Confederation ranking to determine the teams which will advance to the FIVB World U-19 Beach Volleyball Championship in Cyprus in July.

NORCECA had previously invited National Federations (NFs) to register for a qualification tournament, which was slated for Costa Rica from April 2-12. However, subsequent to the registration deadline only six out of a required minimum of 12 teams registered for the qualifier, which would have seen six teams advance to Cyprus.

The six teams that registered were Jamaica, USA, Canada, Guatemala, St Lucia, and Costa Rica. With less than the minimum number of registered teams, NORCECA was forced to cancel the qualifier. JaVA’s concern, however, stems from the decision to resort to using the ranking system to select the teams that would advance.

Major Warrenton Dixon, president of JaVA, in expressing his disgruntlement, stated that Jamaica missed out on participating in the U-21 and U-23 World Beach Volleyball Championships because NORCECA said that they could not identify a host for qualifiers to these events, therefore they resorted to using the ranking system.

“Although we do not recall receiving any request to examine the possibility of hosting any of these events we chose to accept that decision because we knew we would not have been given the financial support required to host them,” explained Dixon.

“However, we were given our rightful opportunity in the U-19 Qualifier and we posited that it would be grossly unfair to take that opportunity and give it to NFs that failed to register, either because they lacked interest, lacked a team or lacked the financial resources necessary.

“We did not budget for this and many of the things we budget for we cannot find funding for. We were presented with what we assessed to be a glorious opportunity and we took steps to seize it. There would now be NFs with greater affluence who did not register, but would now be presented with an unearned opportunity to walk right into the World Championship. Despite our lack of funding support we have been making sacrifices to provide the kids with the preparation we can afford.

“In March this year we sent one of the boys to Cayman along with a senior player to get added exposure in the NORCECA Senior Beach Volleyball Tour. Additionally, we entered them in the UWI Beach Volleyball Invitational just to provide them with better competition than they currently face at their age group locally, and they acquitted themselves well,” the JaVA boss further added.

Cristobal Marte, President of NORCECA, in his e-mail response to JaVA so far, agreed with the line of arguments posited by JaVA, but has reserved final judgment until the NORCECA Board of Administrators meet later this weekend.

Marte noted that the ranking system must be respected, but also supported the point that if NFs did not register for the qualifier, it indicates they were prepared to forfeit participation in the event, whatever the reason might be.

If the NORCECA Board of Administrators rules in favour of JaVA it would mark the first time that a Jamaican team advances to a World Beach Volleyball event. Major Dixon did highlight, however, that advancing to Cyprus would present its own set of challenges. “Well, if we advance we would have a new financial hurdle to get past It is one thing to make sacrifices to purchase tickets to Costa Rica; Cyprus would be a whole new trouble but it would be welcomed trouble.”