It is 13 years since Audrey Cooper set foot on an Olympic volleyball court. Unusually, there was sand between her feet. Now she has more solid foundations as she builds towards London 2012.

Cooper - who partnered England's Mo Glover in the inaugural Olympic beach tournament in Atlanta in 1996 - remains the only Scot to have played in an Olympic volleyball event.

Now, as the new head coach of the Great Britain women's indoor team, she is plotting a course which she hopes will see a British team compete with distinction in 2012.

Her ninth placing in Atlanta - achieved while she was also holding down a full-time job - shows how driven she was and it has not changed over the years.

She inherited the head coach's job from Lorne Sawula earlier this year, a Canadian who had coached his own national team as well as being in charge of Switzerland, Sweden and Australia.

Cooper, brought up in Whitburn, knows she owes a lot to her predecessor as she tries to put her own hallmark on the team, an onerous task given that the budget for the GB volleyball programme has recently been slashed by almost 60 per cent.

"I'm really enjoying it and I'm fortunate to be working with a great bunch of athletes," she outlines, "There are not many women's head coaches in world volleyball although Lang Ping obviously stands out [the Chinese coach to America’s Olympic silver medallists in Beijing].

"Lorne had a wealth of experience and was very open and shared his knowledge of international volleyball. You can watch international volleyball and play it to the level we competed at in the home nations but obviously it was not to the level that Lorne was used to.

"He opened so many doors for us and we've pretty much played every style of international volleyball from Russia to the Dominican Republic to Japan and, without Lorne, we'd never have touched those countries.

"So far, it's been pretty much business as usual after the funding cuts. However, if additional money does not come in then I think it will affect the programme.

"It's key that we have the funding to allow us to stay together until September next year and then we're looking at basing the team abroad like the GB men did in Holland.

"It would have been nice to do it in 2009 but we're not ready for that yet and so we're looking at next year.

"When I told the girls of my plans I had 100 per cent backing from them. They are willing to go whenever to wherever in the world to achieve this.

"Not one of them said that they had this on or that on or had studies or didn't have any money, there were just no questions from them.

"I think when the programme first started they had a bit of an understanding of what commitment was involved but I now think they appreciate it more.

"They are a hungry bunch of athletes and they have given up a lot to be here - from relationships, to jobs to personal development to studies.

"That's why it would be a shame if we could not go the extra mile with the funding."

Cooper took the decision to switch to coaching after missing out on qualifying for the beach event at Sydney and went on to coach English champions London Malory and then England.

"When I didn't make the Games in 2000, I did a lot of soul-searching for five months after that and that's why I decided to go into coaching," she explains.

"Some people think it was a natural thing to do but you never know if you are going to enjoy it or for how long you'll be in the job. So that was the time when I made the transition.

"It's a big difference now with a full-time programme. It used to be the case coaching England where you would train for one weekend and then you had to wait a month to get the squad together again, by which time you had to start again.

"Things are so much better now and we're getting much more consistent. Our skills are now getting up to scratch but there's still an element when we go into matches that we're still playing catch-up.
"We were caught a little bit in our first European League match against France but part of that was because we did not have enough game experience."

Cooper has a busy summer ahead and is attempting to steer the team into the Final Four of the inaugural women's European League, against France, Turkey and Romania.

It will mean a first visit to Scotland with the GB team on June 13-14 where Meadowbank will host a double-header against Romania.

"I hope we'll get a good crowd and I'm confident we will," she says, "I have personal memories of watching a Scotland v England match at Meadowbank when there was a big crowd and it was a great atmosphere.

"It's good for the sport to have matches in Scotland and it's nice we have Scottish players in the team and they can have friends and family there.

"That can bring its own pressure but you have to learn to deal with those situations as a player."

RM
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