Deep Dish Schools Tournament Takes Sandbanks by Storm!

On Tuesday 2nd June, amongst the hectic setting-up of posts, nets, and marquees for the BUCS Championships and Club Championships later that week, we invited schools from Bournemouth and surrounding areas to come down to Sandbanks Beach for a day of friendly (yet fierce!) competition. 6 boys’ teams and 10 girls’ teams from 4 local schools gathered on the beach for a 4v4 tournament, with school pride and major bragging rights on the line. Despite some pretty windy conditions - as we’ve come to expect at Sandbanks - the sun surprisingly stayed put for the whole tournament, making for a very enjoyable day at the beach. We had a big range of students, some with experience playing competitively for local clubs, and others who had never played volleyball before!

After initial pool play, where students fought hard to come out on top, the teams were seeded into Gold and Silver brackets. From there, teams competed against others of a similar level, which led to some lung-busting and hustle-inducing rallies. Following a well-earned lunch break, the top teams from each bracket competed in Semi-Finals and Finals, to crown the ultimate schools’ champions. In the girls’ competition, a team of keen volleyballers from Weymouth prevailed, whilst for the boys, an experienced team from LEAF Studio came out on top! The overall winning school was LEAF Studio, with multiple teams medalling in both the boys and girls divisions.

The Sandbanks Schools Tournament is just one aspect of a wider goal across Deep Dish this year: to increase young people’s participation in our venues, by engaging schools within our local communities. At our Crystal Palace venue, we have been running free coached sessions for schools at the beach courts to widen participation, and this week we will be running the London School Beach Volleyball Championships, which will engage schools from across London in a 4v4 competition. At the heart of our mission, we hope to provide access to beach volleyball to more young people who may not have opportunities to get involved in the sport, and in turn help our local communities be part of the active beach lifestyle we promote at Deep Dish.

Huge thanks to all the schools who came down to get involved, and well done to the students who played their absolute best all day. We can't wait to keep welcoming schools back to this event for years to come!

-Gracie

Juniors Coordinator