Fresh from winning a historic silver medal at the Asian Games, the Thai women's volleyball team will take part in the AVC Cup in Nakhon Ratchasima beginning Sunday.
The biennial tournament features 10 teams -- hosts Thailand, Japan, South Korea, China, Taiwan, Kazakhstan, the Philippines, Iran, Australia and Vietnam.
The Sept 16-23 event will be shown live on Thai Rath TV (32).
Thailand will take on Japan on Sunday and play South Korea next Tuesday.
The sixth edition of the tournament will be a good test for Thai players ahead of the world championship to be held in Japan from Sept 29-Oct 20, Thailand coach Danai Sriwatcharamethakul told a press conference yesterday.
He said he had called up some youth players to join the senior stars in the squad.
"The AVC [Asian Volleyball Confederation Cup] is similar to the Asian championship," Danai said.
"We want to give young players chances to play alongside the senior ones."
Thailand ended up runners-up after losing to China at the Asian Games earlier this month.
It was their best ever result at the quadrennial event.
Danai has not yet announced his squad for the AVC Cup but key players such as captain Pleumjit Thinkaow, Nootsara Tomkom and Ajcharaporn Kongyot are expected to lead the team.
The coach said he wanted to steer the team to the country's first ever Olympic appearance in the sport at Tokyo 2020.