APR cruise past Stef Auto in opener

Pool A, ResultAPR 3-2 Stef Auto (MAD) Today APR vs Bejaia (ALG) 9pm RWANDAN WOMEN volleyball champions APR on Thursday afternoon cruised past Stef Auto of Madagascar with a hard fought 3-2 (25-18, 21-25, 25-21, 27-29, 17-15) win in their first match of the African Clubs’ competition.Viateur ‘Lado’ Sibomama’s team, which is half-way into the quarter final, take on Bejaia in the last Pool A fixture this evening at 9m local time at Palais des Sports Hall in Antananarivo. “We are happy for the first win; we are looking forward to win the last game in the group so we can finish on top, we are determined because the first win gave us motivation to do better in the next game (today),” APR coach Sibomana told Saturday Sport from Antananarivo.Kenyan teams recorded victories after a good start on Thursday. Kenya Prisons, who are the defending champions and former champions Kenya Pipeline both collected convincing wins on day one, dismissing Kutlwano from Botswana and Manga Sports from Gabon 3-0 respectively. Algeria’s GS Petrioliers posted a 3-0 win over Ethiopia’s Water Sport in the first Group B match. Fifteen participating teams were divided into four pools in the preliminary round. Defending champions and 4 time African heroes Prisons is pitted against Water Sport (Ethiopia), GS Petrolier (Algeria) and Kutlwano (Botswana). Record holders Pipeline (7 cups) face Manga Sport (Gabon), Les AS (Burundi) and Ndejje University (Uganda) in Pool C. Five time African Champions Al Ahly (Egypt) take on AS Tanda (Cote d’Ivoire), FAP (Cameroon) and VB Diamand (Madagascar). Each pool will play a round robin format where the top two teams qualify automatically to the quarterfinal of 1 to 8 places, while the teams placed third and fourth will compete for 9 to 16 positions.Thursday resultsPool B:GS Petroliers (ALG) beat Water Sport (ETH) 3-0 (25-18, 25-10, 25-15)Prisons (KEN) beat Kutlwano (BOT) 3-0 (25-11, 25-16, 25-14)Pool C:Pipeline (KEN) beat Manga Sport (GAB) 3-0 (25-17, 25-11, 25-9)Ndejje University (UGA) beat Les As (BUR) 3-0 (25-15, 25-21, 25-10)Pool DAhly (EGY) beat FAP (CMR) 3-0 (25-18, 25-11, 25-19)AS Tanda (CIV) beat VB Diamand (MAD) 3-2 (25-20, 22-25, 20-25, 25-23, 15-13)