The CNVLD spoke with Cambodian National Coach Christian Zepp on his return to a snow-swept Germany following the Cambodian National Standing Volleyball team taking 4th at the Cambodia Cellcard 2009 WOVD Volleyball World Cup.

What is your assessment of the Cambodian teams performance?
At first glance this years’ performance including becoming number four in the world again, one might think this is the best result Cambodia can achieve. But when taking a closer look to the circumstances we had to train and prepare in, one will realize that the Cambodian team had to fight against many odds. With the knowledge of all the struggle and problems we had to face, this years result has to be satisfying for the players, the CNVLD and Cambodia as a whole. Nevertheless I am sure that we could have won Bronze again – but we lost on inexperience, over-motivation and too many unforced errors. The Cambodian National Volleyball Team has to work on these factors a lot.
 
Your impressions of the tournament as a whole?
The tournament was organized with a much higher standard combined to the World Cup 2007. The media interest including live-to-air-broadcasting and the huge advertisement campaigns were great. Amazing were the crowds coming to the stadium to see all nations compete – with sometimes heavily packed seats, which was really amazing. So when looking at the tournament only, the World Cup was really stunning.
 
How you think the other international teams reacted to the standard / quality of the tournament?
As far as I know from talking to the other nations, everybody loved the tournament, the organization and the atmosphere at the stadium. One thing all the nations fascinated was the very fair behaviour of the Cambodian people, cheering for every team when defending a difficult ball or attacking a great spike.
 
Where will Standing Volleyball go next?
Standing Volleyball as it has been played at the Olympic Stadium in Phnom Penh/Cambodia is the best sport disabled people can play. It is more than spectator friendly and offers a lot of action. This sport does not lack anything. If you have seen those games during the World Cup, you will agree with me. But I guess that Standing Volleyball has to fight a long way to get back into the Paralympic family. In my opinion, developing more annual/biannual regional competitions in both Indoor Volleyball and Beachvolleyball might be a very good first step, to make more nations be interested in Standing Volleyball again – which, as a result, might lead towards to re-inclusion of Standing Volleyball either as Indoor Volleyball or as Beachvolleyball into the Paralympic Games.