The maiden edition of the North Central Volleyball Classics served off in Jos the Plateau state capital yesterday (May 17, 2021) with team Plateau defeating team Benue by 3 straight sets.
Declaring the classics open, the Commissioner for Sports, Plateau State, Hon. Victor Lapang, while welcoming all participating states, said he hoped to see the best of volleyball on display. He praised the efforts of Mal. Alhassan Yakmut, one of the organizers of the classics, and said he was happy with the logistics Yakmut has put in and hoped that other organizations and individuals will do same. Hon. Lapang on behalf of the state government promised the Most Valuable Player (MVP) of the Classics the sum of Fifty Thousand naira to the delight of participating teams.
Alhassan Yakmut, a former National volleyball player and retired civil servant, who is one of the sponsors of the classics, said he was using the classics to celebrate his 60th birthday which was on the 5th of May, 2021.
The former Director General of National Sports Commission went further to give reasons why he choose to sponsor the classics, according to Yakmut, “The reason for having this tournament is to return volleyball back to the Plateau and we will start by a pilot programme using the 7 states in the North Central including the FCT, as soon as we start this, we will build on it and make it a national competition. You can see the lineup of players here, most of the players playing for other states were all brought up in Plateau state, so volleyball is back home”. Yakmut, said he intends to sustain the tournament on a yearly basis.
Day one of the classics witnessed two matches with Team Plateau defeating Team Benue in 3 straight sets, 3-0. Team Kogi decided to continue from where Team Plateau stopped by also defeating Team FCT 3-0 too.
Matches will continue today, Tuesday 17th of May, 2021 at 9am with the male teams of Kogi and Nasarawa lighting up the court before the female teams will open their accounts.