Tehran, Iran, March 31, 2016 – The national volleyball players of Iran started their trainings on March, 27 under the supervision of Juan Cichello.

The trainings are held within two groups of A and B. Fourteen players including Saeid Marouf, Sayyed Mohammad Mousavi, Armin Tashakori, Mostafa Sharifat, Farhad Ghaemi, Hamzeh Zarrini, Farhad Nazari Afshar, Milad Ebadipour, Farhad Zarif, Mahdi Marandi, Shahram Mahmoudi, Amir Ghafour, Adel Gholami, and Alireza Behboudi were in Group A while Group B are composed of Mahdi Mahdavi, Mohammad Taher Vadi, Ali Nodouzpour, Mikaeil Tajer, Javad Hossein Abadi, Mahdi Ranjbar, Ali Shafei, Mohammad Fallah, Alireza Mobasheri, Rahman Davoudi, Mojtaba Mirzajanpour, Mohammad Javad Manavinejad, and Mojtaba Shaban.

Team manager Mr. Khosh Khabar said: “The players will not remain in the same group all the time and might switch to the other one depending on our workout plan.”

Raul Lozano is going to join the national team on April 4 to start the second phase of the preparatory training.

President of Iran Volleyball Federation, Dr. Mohammad Reza Davarzani along with Deputy Minister of Youth & Sport Dr. Sajjadi and some other officials also visited them during their training sessions to support the team. The IVF has gone through different tactics including having the new coach to make their Olympic dream come true for the first time in 52 years.

The World Olympic Qualification Tournament will be held between May 28 to June 5 in Japan, with eight strong teams – Iran Australia, China, Venezuela, Canada, Poland, France and hosts Japan, pitted against one another in the single round-robin competition. The best Asian team will secure their berth for the Rio Games, while the top three teams in this tournament will also be eligible for the Games.

The remaining four teams – Algeria, Chile, Mexico and Tunisia, will take part in the other round-robin Olympic Qualification Tournament in Mexico from June 4 to 6.