In something new

AHLI's volleyball team blanked Olympic Keileiba of Tunisia 3-0 to capture the 22nd African volleyball league club championship and book a place in the newly-created world championship for clubs.

The victory was Ahli's fourth title this season and the third in one month. In December, the club won the Arab clubs championship and last month took the national league championship and the cup by beating arch-rivals Zamalek twice.

Winning last week's African championship meant the red shirts automatically qualified for the world clubs championship scheduled to be held in September. The host nation has yet to be chosen.

Ten teams took part in the one-week event at Ahli club. They were divided into two groups of five teams each. Host nation Ahli topped their Group A together with Dwala of Cameroon while Keileiba and FAB of Cameroon took first and second place in Group B.

In the semi-final, Ahli edged FAB 3-2 while Keileiba beat Dwala by the same score. Though they lost both times, the results reflected Cameroon's progress in the sport. FAB took third place honours.

Ahli's Hamdi Safi was named the best player in the tournament, Tunisia's Moaweia Ben Gadar the best playmaker, Ahli's Aiman Roshdi best spiker and Cameroon's Conolou the best defender.

Ahli team captain Maged Moustafa described the tournament as being very tough and tiring. "We were exhausted after having played for the league and cup titles the past two weeks. But we wanted to win because we wanted to become the first team to qualify for the world championship," said Moustafa, who works as a pharmacist. The 35-year-old captain said he will consider retirement following the world championship.

The team will now take a one-month break after which it will start training for its -- and the world's -- first global club tournament.