The Chinese women's volleyball team posted two sixth-place finishes, respectively at the FIVB Women's World Championship and the Volleyball Nations League, last year. With the return of the team's star spiker Zhu Ting and the rise of a new generation of players, Team China is confident in producing better performances this year and securing a spot at the 2024 Paris Olympics. [Photo/Xinhua]
The Chinese women's volleyball team will try to do their best at the upcoming Paris Games, said head coach Cai Bin on Thursday.
"We will take every opponent seriously and make good preparation and hopefully we can play to our standard," Cai told Xinhua after the team's first training session at the South Paris Arena 1 Thursday afternoon.
"The Olympics are coming and every team is ready, we will just try our best," he added. "We are focusing on our first match against the United States."
Featuring several Rio Olympic champions including Zhu Ting, Yuan Xinyue, Gong Xiangyu, the Chinese women were bracketed with defending champion the United States, host nation France and reigning world champion Serbia in Group A.
Twelve teams will play round robin in three groups in the preliminaries with the top two finishers from each group and the best two third finishers to qualify for the knock-out stage.
China will face the United States on Monday in their opening match in Paris.