Chennai Spartans geared up to mount strong challenge

: The Chennai Spartans team is geared up to mount a strong challenge in the inaugural Pro Volleyball League, which gets underway at Kochi on Saturday.

The captain Shelton Moses is upbeat about the team's prospects and said the target is to reach the playoffs first.

"We have a strong team put together with the right balance of experience and youth.

Our target is to make it to the playoffs so that we can take advantage of home support during the second leg in Chennai," he added.

The team boasts of players like Kapil Dev, G S Akhin, Naveen Raja Jacob and others, apart from Moses and foreigners like Ruslan Sorokins (Latvia) and Rudy Verhoeff (Canada).

The team is coached by M H Kumara, a FIVB Level-3 coach with M Ramesh as his assistant.

Meanwhile, Indian international player G S Akhin is looking forward to the League and said the team had a mix of experience and youth which could prove beneficial.

"I feel we have a good blend of both experience and upcoming talent and we have two good foreign players inRuslan Sorokins from Latvia and Rudy Verhoeff from Canada. Both of them are Olympians and will be key to our progress in the tournament."