Newcomers to the tournament the Netherlands may be struggling to find their first win at the 2021 FIVB Men's Volleyball Nations League, but national team veteran of 10 years Nimir Abdel-Aziz has found no difficulty in immediately establishing himself as one of the competition's top scorers.
VNL 2021
Nimir Abdel-Aziz leading Dutch in search of new heights
The 29-year-old team captain sees VNL as opportunity to reach level of top world teams
Published 03:06, 03 Jun 2021
Nimir Abdel-Aziz celebrates as he leads the Netherlands in new quest for return to top-level world volleyball.
The 29-year-old enjoyed a wonderful club season, during which he led Trentino Itas to the final of the European Champions League with some remarkable performances as opposite. And when his side ran out of setters following Covid-19 infections, Nimir stepped in to take on that role with astounding success.
"This is the first VNL for us, so it's something new, especially for younger players in our team who don't have a chance to compete often at this level," said Nimir. "Every day we are learning something. Of course we are not accepting that we are losing, because we are learning. We want to play, we want to win sets and games, but it's not easy, because we are now one step behind other teams, but we are here to climb that step."
When thinking of Dutch volleyball, one cannot but reminisce on the country's amazing national teams of the 1990s that dominated the sport at European and world level - and one cannot but wonder if there's potential here to repeat those golden years.
But Nimir is very down to earth.
"We are really far away from that, because the Netherlands in the 90s were one of the best teams in the world, so to speak about that at this moment is not good," he said. "Of course we want to get closer to this team, here we are with the 16 best teams in the world and we can compete against them every day. But to speak about winning things [medals] it's too early. I think every day we show that we can play, but we are not constant yet at this level."
Competing in the VNL at the Rimini 'bubble', where the Netherlands were called in to replace China, is certainly a step in the right direction.
"It's nice to be here," concluded Nimir. "It's one of the biggest tournaments and we got a chance to play against big volleyball teams. We are a little bit behind, because we are new at the VNL, but this tournament will be a big experience and let us see what we need to get a little bit closer to these teams."
