The Boys Volleyball programme, run by Ben Laing, continues to grow in popularity and achieving great results this year.

Senior Boys:

This year has been a hectic year, with the lockdown during August and the Covid pandemic. But thankfully, the biggest of all tournaments, National Secondary Schools’ Volleyball Championships, was able to go ahead in March.

Our team culture was to keep the ball off the floor as we weren’t considered as very tall, so our training was quite often based on defence around the blockers. Game-wise, I think we performed very well: coming third at the Canterbury Secondary Schools’ Championships (before Nationals) and coming 3rd again in the Term 1 Canterbury Schools’ Monday competition. However, out of all the tournaments, I think National tournament was the best because not only was the volleyball fun but also the fact that all the boys were able to have some great team bonding in the same flat was great fun.

So, looking back to this year, I think it provided me with a lot of great memories that I will cherish for the rest of my life. During Term 4, in the Monday competition, we played many teams, only losing to Cashmere High School, and we came 3rd in the overall ranking.

Special thanks to Ben Laing (Coach) and Miss Barker (Manager).

Mark Chang (Senior A Captain)

Junior Boys:

This year has been a great year for Burnside Junior Boys Volleyball, taking first place in everything we could. Unfortunately because of Covid, the South Island Secondary Schools’ Junior Champs was cancelled in late November, when we had the chance to be back-to-back champions from last year. But, we still got to play the Canterbury Secondary Schools’ Junior Champs in early November and thankfully won the Gold medal without dropping a single set to anyone.

As well as that, we won our Monday night competition, only losing one game to Cashmere High School. The boys had a great time playing together and gelled together very well. Overall a great season once again!

Thanks also to coach, Ben Laing, and our manager, Miss Barker.

Thomas Vesty (Junior A Captain)