The two-time Pan American Games champions in women’s volleyball, the National Volleyball Team (Las Reinas del Caribe), ranked number 11 in the world, will debut this Sunday morning at 3:00 am against Italy, ranked number one in the world, in their first match of the Olympic Games Paris, France, 2024.
This will be the fourth participation in the Olympic Games of the Queens of the Caribbean. Their first time was in Athens 2004, where they achieved only one victory and that was against the United States, whom they defeated in five hard-fought sets. Milagros Cabral scored the last point to give the victory to the country.
Their next stop was the London 2012 Olympics where they performed spectacularly, taking fifth place and where Brenda Castillo was chosen in the “Sexteto Estrella” as the best libero. They failed to qualify for Rio de Janeiro 2016, but in 2021 they were back at the Japan Games, where they failed to advance to the finals.
Coach Marcos Kwiek will have his official squad for the competition, which is composed of Nivera Marte and Ariana Rodríguez, setters, and attackers Brayelin Martínez, Bethania de la Cruz, Madeline Guillén and Yonkaira Peña. The middle blockers will be Candida Arias, Jineirys Martinez and Lisvel-Eve Mejia, the opposites will be Gaila Gonzalez and the junior, Alondra Tapia and as libero, the stellar Brenda Castillo.
“We are going to fight every point and every set, in an Olympic Games nobody gives anything away, we have arrived here very well prepared,” said foreman Marcos Kwiek.
He affirmed that everyone knows how tough the players of the Queens of the Caribbean are, they never give up and fight until the last point.
The Dominicans held a training base two weeks before the Games and held friendly matches with the teams from France and Serbia.
Source:Hoy.com.do
