Britain Has A Strong Team —Reid

Lizzie Reid believes Team GB have a very strong women’s volleyball squad for London 2012 and was overjoyed to have won selection.

The Walthamstow star had her place confirmed in the 12-strong group on Friday and will now compete on the greatest sporting stage in front of her friends and family in her home city.

And she doesn’t have much longer to wait either, with the volleyball competition running throughout the duration of the Games.

The British women begin their quest for a medal the day after the opening ceremony and will hope to still be involved on the penultimate day of the Games when the medals are decided.

And Reid can’t wait to get going with the competition.

“I am extremely excited,” she enthused.

“We have a very strong squad. We are training everyday just to make sure we are the best we can be come the Olympic Games.”

She continued: “It doesn’t really seem real yet. Every time I go back it doesn’t look like my home city because they have changed it so much.

“I have people I went to school with coming up to me and my very first volleyball coach is going to be watching.”

The 23-year-old has most recently been on scholarship at the University of Georgia, America, and so is accustomed to coming up against the world’s top talent in the sport.

Britain will first meet Russia in Pool A and will also face Algeria, Japan, Italy and the Dominican Republic.

The format of the competition sees the 12 teams divided into two pools of six with each team playing the other five in their group once.

The top four from each pool will progress to the knock-out stages of the competition.

Reid and the squad will play one game per day with a day off between each fixture, and while she feels the British squad is strong, she is also wary of the strength of the opposition.

“We have played Japan a few times and they are very good. They have a very similar style to us. I think Japan definitely will be the toughest (match),” she explained.

“We played the Dominican Republic I think it was four or five years ago but they have changed a lot since then. We have scouted them a lot and tried to study their game.”

The volleyball competition will be held at Earls Court and Reid competed in the test event held a year ago at the venue when Britain took on the Netherlands and Japan.