Hong Kong, August 9, 2007 - The “Meet the Players Press Conference” was held this afternoon in the Hong Kong Coliseum at 3 pm. Officiating VIPs included the President of Volleyball Association of Hong Kong, China, Mr. Victor Hui, SBS, JP, Mr. William Ko, MH, Convenor of the Advisory Panel of the Major Sports Events Committee under the Sports Commission of the HKSAR and Ms. Crystal Choi, Executive Director, Hong Kong Health Check and Laboratory Holdings Company Limited, Title Sponsor of the 2007 FIVB World Grand Prix – Hong Kong. Sitting at the Head Table also were the four Team Managers of the China Team, the Dominican Republic Team, the Italy Team and the Poland Team respectively.
After the introduction of the Teams and photo-taking, a game was played among the four teams. Each team captain was paired with either an artist from TVB or a member of the female national beach volleyball player. Each team was given a few pieces of jigsaw puzzles of the cover design for the Souvenir Programme of the 10^th Anniversary of the HKSAR for the 2007 FIVB World Grand Prix – HK. This cover was uncovered by Mr. Victor Hui and Ms Crystal Choi to show the teams the picture of the jigsaw puzzle while Mr. William Ko sounded the hong for the 4 teams to start the race to see which team could finish the jigsaw puzzle first. Among the cheering of their teammates and the clapping of the VIPs and guests, the team of Italy was the first to finish putting all the pieces in place followed by Poland, China and Dominican Republic. The VIPs then presented some cash award to each of the team ending the first part of the Press Conference in a happy and cheerful atmosphere.
Then the four coaches and the team captains of each of the team were seated at the head table for the questions and answers session. One of the questions directed at Mr. Marco Bonitta, Head Coach of Poland was that the Poland Team and the China Team had met recently in Poland and reporters liked to know what kind of strategies he had planned now that he had seen the new China Team. Of course, Mr. Marco would not give a “direct” answer and simply replied that he considered the China Team a very strong opponent.

Reporters were most interested in Mr. Marco Bonitta because after the 2006 World Championships, he resigned from the team despite the fact that he has led the Italy Team to numerous victories in the past few years. He became the Head Coach of Poland since then and as the first match of this Hong Kong leg was Italy vs Poland, everyone was dying to see what new strategies he would be using as he knew the strength and weakness of many of the players in the Italy Team. Who will be the winner of this match? What tactics will the Head Coach of Italy Team used to ward off the attack of the Poland Team with Mr. Bonitta Marco as Head Coach? Will the players in the Italy Team felt more pressure when their former head Coach is now coaching their opponents? These must be the questions in most of the minds of the spectators and of course the Head Coaches of the other teams as well.
All in all, all the Head Coaches were most diplomatic in their answers when asked about how they felt about their opponents not wanting to leak any strategies they have planed for this tournament in Hong Kong.
The Press Conference ended at 4.00 pm.