NAIROBI, Aug. 12 (Xinhua) -- Kenya will compete in this year's men's Under-23 African Nations Championship in Cairo, Egypt from Oct. 12-19.
It will be the first time the country will be taking part in the competition in the men's cadre. Algeria and Egypt have dominated the competition, but Kenya is looking forward to use the event as part of its build up to a strong team that will compete at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics qualifiers.
According to Tarek Al-Adwar, the Confederation of African Volleyball (CAVB) Press Officer, the tournament will be open to the best 12 teams from the continent. The Championship is only open to players who were born in 1997 or after.
"We are expecting the best talent from Africa to continue using the age competitions to build their careers. Over 12 teams will compete," said Al-Adwar said in a statement issued on Sunday.
CAVB has also confirmed that the competition will be will not serve as part of Africa teams to qualify for any international championship.
"It is the decision of the CAVB Board to keep the youngsters busy and to maintain their underage international career," said Al-Adwar.
Alongside Kenya and host Egypt other teams are Rwanda, Botswana, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, Libya, Cameroon, DRC, South Africa and Seychelles.
Earlier this year, the FIVB decided have the World Under-23 Championship after every four years and not Biennial as was the case before.
It means that though, Africa will still host the competition every two years, this year's event will not be used for qualification purposes.
However, the 2022 championships will be used to select Africa's two representatives to the World Under-23 Championships.
Algeria won the last edition in 2016 and represented Africa in the 2017 Men's U23 World Championship along with organizers Egypt. The women's tournament will be organized by Nigeria.
During the last world Under-23 women's championships, Kenya finished bottom of the pile among 12 teams that competed in the championships hosted in Mexico and which was won by China.
Kenya and Egypt were the only African representatives in the tournament. Kenya faced South American champions Brazil, and later on Bulgaria, Cuba, Japan and Turkey in a tough Group B.
Meanwhile, the international volleyball federation (FIVB) recently announced a number of changes that will be introduced in the tournament, including reducing the number of maximum points that can be amassed by the winning team in a set from 25 to 15.
