GUANGZHOU, China, June 20 (Xinhua) -- "It's the first time that we have been abroad to play volleyball games. We feel so delighted to play against those great teams like China, Brazil and Russia," said Mokgadi Maphaba, both a volleyball player and a high school student, from South Africa.
The 19-year-old girl is participating in the first edition of the BRICS Games in Guangzhou city, south of China. During the week-long period, they have played round-robin matches with four other teams - China, Russia, Brazil and India. But unluckily, Maphaba and her teammates didn't take even one set from their opponents, finished with a four-game losing streak.
"We have never played at this level before. The other four teams are all professional players, they are used to playing on the international stage, but we are different. We are not professional, we don't make our livings by playing volleyball. We play it only for passion and love."
"Playing in front of so many audience is incredible, although we are not as good as the other four teams, we can still feel the support from the Chinese fans. It made us nervous but also excited," Maphaba said.
The head coach of the team Hugan Coopsamy, a former professional volleyballer in South Africa, said that all his players are still students, ranging from 17 to 19 years old and they only had four days of training before coming to China.
"Volleyball is not as popular as football or rugby in South Africa, we didn't have too many youth players to select to set up the squad," Coopsamy said, "But the BRICS Games is a good try which gave our players a good chance to compete with the top ones, we had never imagined this before."
Maphaba started to play volleyball four years ago. She said that she chose volleyball because it's a highly confrontational sport, but without body contact.
"I feel grateful that I play volleyball, it gave me a lot opportunities to travel around the country to play games, which largely widen my horizon."
Maphaba's parents divorced several years ago, now she lives with her mother and grandmother. The eldest daughter in the family also has a little brother and sister.
"My families all supported me to play volleyball, sometimes they also came to watch my games. They said they were proud of me when watching me stand on the court."
After the defeat to host China 3-0 Tuesday evening, Maphaba has finished all her volleyball-related staff at the BRICS Games. She will have one day to explore the city before going back to South Africa, which she is really looking forward to.
"I hope the BRICS Games can continue to be held in the future, communicating with those top players and learning different culture were a memorable experience for me. I also want to see our country be the host one day and to invite these good teams to play in South Africa, it will be a great honor for us. I believe that our team will be stronger that time," said Maphaba.
