Jennifer Thom has had to reassess her goals. The Team Edinburgh and Scotland player is one of an elite group of players now setting their sights on playing at the London Olympics in 2012.

The student teacher, who learned the game at Queensferry High School, had to change her ambitions overnight after the decision to award the Olympics to London.  An initial grant of over £4 million has been set aside to create British volleyball teams capable of competing on the world stage for the first time.

It is a tall order but Great Britain’s women’s team will play their first matches together at the end of June against Switzerland and Thom is hoping to be part of the squad.

New coach Lorne Sawula, former coach to the national teams of Canada, Switzerland and Sweden, has now taken over full-time and the three-match series against the Swiss will give him an idea of how much work he has to do.

Thom, a member of the GB training squad since it began, has now targeted a full-time career as a volleyball player and is training daily.  She believes the fresh money has everyone in the sport aiming much higher and attempting to reach their full potential.

 “The Scotland team has come on a lot over the past year and it’s a lot to do with the GB training with so many Scots involved. My diet has changed and the training programme is more intense,” she said.

“It’s a lot more structured. Before, I was doing training and then gym work but now I know exactly what I’m doing each day. Everything is looked at from diet right through to physical preparation.

“There is a lot of input from a lot of people and I never imagined I’d get this chance when I first started out playing. It’s a tremendous opportunity and I want to make the most of it.”

Thom helped her club win another league and cup double this season and although there was some disappointment for Scotland at the European “C” Championships in Glasgow in May, where the host nation could only finish fifth, the team improved in every match.
But moving from what was effectively a small nation’s tournament to rubbing shoulders with the established nations in the world is a different matter.

The British squad will be based full-time in Sheffield and it may mean players having to give up playing for their clubs.  That is something Sawula and Wayne Coyle, the GB programme manager, are currently assessing.

From nothing, the GB women’s team will need to build up a full international programme in a bid to enhance their status and get themselves into a position where they can mount a realistic challenge for a European place.

Sawula, who helped Canada to eighth place at the 1984 Olympics, knows there is a lot to be done in a short space of time but is not going in blind.
“Britain has a fantastic opportunity to further develop the world-class programme and I am fully confident I can achieve success working with the programme and the players involved,” he said.

RM

© Copyright In The Winning Zone, MMVII, All Rights Reserved

www.scottishvolleyball.org