ULU Volleyball Teams

The ULU Volleyball club has a men's and a women's competitive team, as well as a recreational team for people who want to play on a less competitive basis, or for beginners/ intermediate players who want to improve their skills. Membership to either team costs £25 for the whole season.

The competitive teams

Both the men's and the women's teams recruit players with a significant amount of experience, with many of the current players having played for an average of 7 to 15 years.

Training takes place once or twice a week, with matches taking place once a week on average. For more information on training times and venues, click here. For the latest fixtures and results, click here.

Both teams participate in the same standard of competition. This includes:

The London League (LVA)

Both the men and the women participate in the Premier Division of the London League (the top women's Division used to be called Division 1). Home matches are played at Bacon's College Sports Centre on Fridays. ULU is generally considered one of the strongest teams in the League (see club successes), and brought home the double last year. Both the men's and women's teams have won the title in 2005 and 2006 as well.

EVA Student Cup

The English Volleyball Association (EVA) organises a Student Cup each year. The finals take place in Leeds in February each year and are looked forward to by all ULU players. ULU has generally done very well at the Student Cup each year (see club successes), with the ULU men having brought home the cup four times since 2001!

BUSA (British Universities Sports Association)

Since some of the individual University of London Colleges compete in BUSA, it was not until 2003, that ULU actually started competing as its own team in the BUSA competition. In 2003, ULU was placed in Tier 2 of the South East league and both teams easily won all their matches and then went on to bring home the BUSA Shield title in March 2004. In 2007-08 ULU is entering a 2nd women's team in the Tire 2 South East league.

Since 2004-2005, the South East League Tier 1 playing format has been three 1-day tournaments. This turned out to be a huge success and has since been copied in many other divisions.

BUSA Finals are usually held in Loughborough in mid-March.

National Cup

In 2007-08 the women's team is entering the National Cup organised by the EVA. It is a knock-out competition at which all National Divsion 1 and 2 teams participate. More info can be found here.

English Universities

London University players also have a chance to try-out for the English Universities team that competes in the annual Home Nations Tournament. In the past the following ULU players have played for the English Universities: Albrecht Glitz, Hendrik Neubert, Nicolas Ruh, Kathleen Noreisch, Dasha Sobornova.

London Challenge Trophy

The 2005-06 season saw the introduction of the London Challenge Trophy. The idea was to bring most of the strongest teams in the country, most of which happen to be based in London together in one competition. This included the London based National League Div 1 teams and the top London League Premier Division teams. ULU men and women beat numerous National League teams and both came second at the finals in Crystal Palace.

The competition ran only the season 2005-06.

 

<Athina> A. Vlachantoni@lse.ac.uk mail to webmaster do you ULU?