After winning nine matches in a row in the preliminary rounds of the 2015 FIVB Women's Volleyball World Grand Prix, coach Jenny Lang Ping has decided to give her star spikers a short break to get them better prepared for the upcoming World Cup.
Lang Ping and the "Starting Seven" of the Chinese team, namely Zhu Ting, Hui Ruoqi, Shen Jingsi, Yuan Xinyue, Yang Junjing, Zeng Chunlei and libero Lin Li, were training in Beijing on Thursday while the backup players spearheaded by assistant coach An Jiajie lost their opening match in the World Grand Prix Finals in Omaha, Nebraska.
"They (the regular starters) are pretty tired after playing most of the nine matches in the past three weeks and I would like to give them a break," said Lang Ping. "I think they need some rest and more sleep to get better prepared physically for the World Cup."
The women's World Cup, which is slated for August 22 to September 6 in Japan with two tickets to the Rio Olympic Games on offer, will be this year's most important tournament for the Chinese women, who surprisingly finished runners up at the World Championships last fall in Italy.
"It's good to win nine in a row, but we have to understand that this year's World Grand Prix is not as competitive as last year's. A lot of teams are missing their key players, so we can not be overoptimistic," Lang added. "We also had some ups and downs, sometimes we had too many unforced errors, I think we still need to work hard to be a really strong team."
Liu Yanyan and Wang Yunlu, who replaced Zhu and Hui as side hitters in the Chinese team playing in the USA, scored 15 and 10 points respectively in their 23-25, 25-20, 25-16, 25-14 loss to Brazil in the first match of the World Grand Prix Finals on Wednesday with backup opposite player Zhang Changning adding 15.
"It will be great learning experience for them," said Lang Ping. "They have also trained very hard and need to improve through competitions."
China will play Japan in the second round of the six-team round robin tournament with Russia, USA and Italy also in contention.
