Volleyball England is delighted to announce that the Government has given the green light for competitive indoor volleyball and beach volleyball.

Actions plans for each discipline were submitted to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport in the last fortnight and on 27th July, the long-awaited return of volleyball was confirmed.

With immediate effect, volleyball activity (6v6 indoor volleyball, 2v2 beach volleyball and 6v6 outdoor volleyball) can now take place as long as the necessary modifications and safety measures are in place to mitigate the transmission risk of the coronavirus.

Behind the scenes, the Hub team and our Return to Volleyball Working Group volunteers have been working hard to prepare detailed guidance to allow the sport to return. Crucially, competitions should only resume once the necessary risk assessments and safety plans are in place and when organisers are confident that Government, venue and Volleyball England advice can be followed.

Sue Storey, Chief Executive of Volleyball England, said: “We are extremely happy to announce the Government has confirmed that our plans are in line with their guidance. This means we have been given the green light to get back on the sand, the grass and the court and play our sport again, both in training and competitively. We are still working hard on our plans for the return of sitting volleyball and hope to to have some positive news to share soon.

“This is a big day and a huge step forward on the road to the full resumption of volleyball. I would like to say a huge thank you to all of those people, most of them volunteers, that have worked so hard and given up countless hours to get us to this stage.

“I wish everyone good luck as they take to the sand, the grass and the courts around the country in the coming weeks – have lots of fun, stay safe but please stick to our guidance.

“We will continue to work hard to help everyone in the volleyball community adapt to this new way of operating, so please keep talking to us.”

Plans are currently being developed for the return of indoor sitting volleyball.

Volleyball England is planning to hold a webinar on Thursday, 6th August at 6.30pm to talk through these plans in more detail and answer any questions. Details of how to join will be published soon.

Updates to follow. Click here for the guidance.

Please email info@volleyballengland.org if you have any questions.

First RAVC online quiz on Tuesday the 21st of April at 7:30 pm

Dear All,

I don’t know about the rest of you but I am getting severe withdrawal symptoms from Volleyball training and whilst we can’t actually train there is no reason why we can’t get together, if only online.

What I am proposing is a quiz, on Tuesday starting on the 21^st April from 19:30. Exact details are to be sorted out, but it will be run by me.

We will try to run it on Zoom, once I have sorted out how to use it myself, and I will send out details closer to the time.

If you want to get involved then please contact me :

Dave Fox                            dave@djfox.plus.com                   07470 989634

Hope to ‘see’ you all there.

Dave Fox (Reading Aces Volleyball Club)

Payments clarification for the rest of this season due to COVID-19

Dear All,

As previously communicated, in light of government advice and with the closure of sports halls and schools, Reading Aces Volleyball club has been forced to stop all training with immediate effect. At this moment we are unsure when training will restart but we will keep you posted. Details will be on the club website at https://readingaces.wordpress.com/ or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/groups/10847690724/.

Note that National Volleyball League and Berkshire Volleyball League have also made the same decision, so matches will were cancelled until further notice.

Those of you who are paying by standing order, please arrange for the payment to stop after the March payment. Anyone who has already paid beyond that point will have credit once training restarts. Anyone who still owes us up to the current March, then please arrange for payment at your earliest convenience; details can be found here: https://readingaces.wordpress.com/membership/fees-2017-18/

If you have any queries then please contact one of the following committee members:

Dave Fox                            dave@djfox.plus.com                   07470 989634

Geoff Collier                       geoffcollier1@gmail.com

Christine Brown                cbrown.ulm@outlook.com

In the meantime, please look after yourselves and I hope to see you soon.

Dave Fox (Reading Aces Volleyball Club Chairman)

No more trainings after Volleyball England and Berkshire Volleyball Association have cancelled all upcoming games and events

Volleyball England has come to the difficult decision to cancel all Volleyball England camps and competitions up until Wednesday, 20 May 2020. The termination of these activities will commence from 9am on Tuesday, 17 March. This will impact all upcoming games and events.

Read more here. Following this announcement the Berkshire Volleyball Association also has decided to suspend all upcoming games.

As a result of this and following the government’s advice, we regret to say that Reading Aces is also suspending the training sessions in all locations until further notice. We might introduce outdoor sessions in May but this is to be decided.

Stay safe and healthy and thank you for your support!

Volleyball England statement about corona virus

Please read here the official statement on corona virus issued by Volleyball England.

Floor has been fixed at Loddon Valley so training is on for both BVA and NVL at 7:30 pm

The Loddon Valley Leisure Centre has fixed the floor so we are now resuming the trainings at our normal time from 7:30 pm – that’s both BVA and NVL teams.

A crucial win again second in the league for our NVL ladies

Congratulations to our NVL ladies for winning 3-1 a crucial game on Sunday. They have faced Bristol VC (currently second in the league). It was an entertaining and tough game with ups and downs but our ladies showed an amazing fighting spirit, coming back from behind in the second set (and just missed on a win) and were 12-20 down in the fourth set but still have managed to win. 25-19, 25-27, 25-22, 26-24. MVP Carly. Well done girls and good luck next Sunday playing Cardiff (fourth in the league). #readingacesnvl #readingaces

First away win in the second leg for our NVL ladies

Congratulations to our NVL ladies for winning their second game of the second leg 2019/20 against Ashcombe Dorking two weeks ago 25-16, 25-17, 26-24, 25-16. MVP Carly Lane! Well done! #readingacesnvl #readingaces

New team training plan for coming weeks

Geoff has spend a considerable amount of time looking into alternative training venues because of the problems with the post fixings at Loddon. There were a couple of very hopeful options for a while but these have both now evaporated.
We are on the 3rd training plan, which uses only the 1 good court at Loddon for 3hrs (plus some extra time at Kendrick on a Monday). This plan goes to the end of the season to cater for the situation that Loddon don’t actually get the court fixed (which is a possibility!) but we can revert back to normal if/when the 2nd court is fixed.

We have tried to arrange the early/late sessions to best fit with the up-coming matches for each team – generally the early slot is preferred by most people and will probably therefore be better attended than the later slot.
This works out quite neatly as NVL and BVA men have matches on alternate weekends over the next 6 weeks! And the Ladies BVA will be training Monday’s when their match is at the weekend.
While this does mean that BVA will have the early slot next week (28th of January), NVL actually get several early slots together later on (as BVA don’t have any matches during that period).

Note that there is a suggestion to have an ‘All Ladies’ session for the early slot on 17th March (with Men on the late slot) as no one has a match that weekend, however we could revert back to straight BVA/NVL if necessary.

Here is the schedule:

		Early session	Late session
		7:30-9:00	9:00-10:30
2020/01/26	Sun	No matches
2020/01/27	Mon	Ladies BVA
2020/01/28	Tue	BVA (Men)	NVL from 8:30
2020/02/02	Sun	Men BVA M214 Kendrick School
2020/02/02	Sun	Ladies L209 Kendrick School
2020/02/03	Mon
2020/02/04	Tue	NVL	BVA from 8:30
2020/02/09	Sun	NVL match Kendrick
2020/02/10	Mon	Ladies BVA
2020/02/11	Tue	BVA (men)	NVL from 8:30
2020/02/16	Sun	NVL away
2020/02/16	Sun	Men BVA Loddon Valley
2020/02/16	Sun	Ladies BVA Reading University
2020/02/17	Mon
2020/02/18	Tue	NVL	BVA
2020/02/22	Sun	NVL away
2020/02/24	Mon	Ladies BVA(?)
2020/02/25	Tue	BVA (men?)	NVL
2020/03/01	Sun	NVL Kendrick
2020/03/01	Sun	Men BVA M217 Ferry Leisure Centre
2020/03/02	Mon	Ladies BVA
2020/03/03	Tue	NVL	BVA
2020/03/08	Sun	NVL away match
2020/03/08	Sun	Ladie BVA Wycombe Leisure Centre
2020/03/09	Mon	(Ladies BVA???)
2020/03/10	Tue	NVL	BVA (Ladies?)
2020/03/15	Sun	NVL Loddon Valley
2020/03/15	Sun	Ladies BVA Reading University
2020/03/16	Mon
2020/03/17	Tue	All Ladies (BVA+NVL)?	Men + tall/NVL ladies??!
2020/03/22	Sun	No Matches
2020/03/23	Mon
2020/03/24	Tue	NVL	BVA
2020/03/29	Sun	NVL away match
2020/03/30	Mon	Ladies BVA
2020/03/31	Tue	BVA (Men)	NVL
2020/04/04	Sat	NVL away match
2020/04/05	Sun	Men BVA M221 Ferry Leisure Centre
2020/04/05	Sun	Ladies BVA L216 The Wren School

We have also negotiated with Laura at Loddon that, as well as the 8:30-9:30 warmup time/area, we can warmup from 7pm in the space occupied by the 2 badminton courts that are immediately adjacent to the good net (they keep badminton off these 2 courts for 1/2hr before our 7:30 start so they can get the volleyball net up (in theory!). So when you have the early slot if you can get there for 7ish you should get a 2 hour session!

There was an issue with putting the net up late on Tuesday and that the martial arts people took a significant time to clear away after our 7:30 start time and Loddon is going to sort that out as well.

We understand that this isn’t ideal and won’t suit all people all of the time however we think its the best we can do with the facilities available. Geoff had some negative feedback when trying to organise these sessions which has made this task less pleasent but thanks to those of you who have shown your appreciation for the time you have had to dedicate to do this.

If there is anyone out there who would like to help with this type of task then please let me know as I’m sure we’ll have some problem or other in the future that will require a big effort from someone to resolve!

Cheers, Geoff

Team training schedule for Tuesdays

Hi all. Due to the court issues at Loddon Valley, both BVA and NVL will train on one court sharing 3 hours. Tomorrow (21/1):

BVA 7:30-9 pm

NVL 9-10:30 with NVL warming up on badminton courts from 8pm. Next week NVL from 7:30 pm and BVA from 9 pm. Thank you!