TEHRAN – Former Iran volleyball coach Mostafa Karkhaneh believes that the 2022 Asian Club Volleyball brought excitement to the country's volleyball fans after some years.

Paykan of Iran came from two sets down to beat Japan's Suntory Sunbirds 3-2 (21-25, 26-28, 25-13, 25-20, 15-12) and won the trophy on Friday.

Paykan signed four volleyball starts before the tournament, namely Earvin N'Gapeth, Nimir Abdel-Aziz, Saeid Marouf, and Mohammad Mousavi to turn into a star-studded team ahead of the competition.

“The tournament level was high and the competition was breathtaking,” said Karkhaneh in his interview with Tehran Times.

 “I have been in the Asian Club Volleyball Championship more than ten times. I can say with certainty that this competition edition was one of the best and strongest ones and the teams showed fantastic performance. This was due to the presence of great players who were playing in this tournament,” he stated.

“Japan's Suntory Sunbirds were a competitive and hard-working team. Dmitriy Muserskiy, Suntory's star, is a great player with a high salary, about one million euros. He can change the result of every game. The same is true for players like Nimir Abdel-Aziz and Earvin N'Gapeth.

“Don't forget that players such as Saeid Marouf and Mohammad Mousavi are also among the best volleyball players in the world,” he added.

The former coach of the Iran national volleyball team says that holding such competitions in Iran is very profitable for the country's volleyball.

“The tournament brought excitement to the volleyball fans in Iran after more than two years. We never had such a large number of spectators in the club volleyball games in our stadiums. I appreciate Paykan Club and the young general manager of this club, Amir Atabakhsh, for accepting the hosting of this tournament and holding it in the best possible way,” he concluded.