Cuban women's volleyball team to debut against Croatia in Grand Prix

HAVANA, Cuba, Jun 3 (acn) The Cuban women's volleyball team will debut today against Croatia in the first round of Group B in the third level Grand Prix, in a match which will take place in the city of Bendigo, Australia.

According to the contest website, Cubans will start playing against Croats, while on Saturday and Sunday they will do it versus the hosts and Colombia.
Due to the latest results against Croatia and Colombia, these two squads appear as the main rivals in this preliminary stage.
Australia vs. Colombia is today's other match in Bendigo, while in Algiers, Algeria, the program includes the matches Kazakhstan-Peru, and the local team against Mexico.
The other eliminatory phase of the third level will be from June 10 to 12, based in Chiclayo, attended by Algeria, Croatia, Cuba and the host of Peru.
The other group will be hosted by the Colombian city of Cali, with the presence of Mexico, Kazakhstan, Colombia and Australia.
Granma newspaper announced that the Cuban coach Roberto Garcia will use as regular players the inside hitters Jennifer Alvarez and Regla Gracia, outside hitter Melissa Vargas, setter Yamila Hernandez and libero Emily Borrell.
Garcia said that due to the time central blocker Alena Rojas, in process of recovery from right shoulder bursitis, was out of the regular players, he will possibly line up the pair of Heidy Casanova with Daymara Lescay.
Group A of this contest includes Belgium, Brazil, China, Germany, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Russia, Serbia, Thailand, Turkey and the United States, while Argentina, Bulgaria, Canada, Czech Republic, Dominican Republic, Kenya, Poland and Portugal appear in poole B.