Wipe it up, volleyballers told
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This is a digitised version of an article from The Cayman Compass's print archive. Occasionally, the digitisation process introduces transcription errors, or other problems.
See the article in its original context from September 1988.
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"In the job application it said volleyball player, not floor wiper," griped star spiker Steve Timmons, who helped power the Americans to an easy three-game victory over Japan on Sunday in their Olympic opener.
The rule was recently adopted by the International Volleyball Federation (FIVB) to speed up play by eliminating frequent interruptions for courtside floor sweepers.
Most of the players now carry small towels in the waistband of their shorts. After they dive or tumble on the court, they try to drop to their knees to clean off the sweat before the next play starts. But some of the American players say they don't want to stoop to that, and they warn of possible injuries.
"The big issue here is the floor wiping," said middle blocker Craig Buck. "In the United States, we've used a Wimbledon-like system where the floor wipers come out, clean the floor and are off before the "We are risking injury to the athletes just to speed the game up for TV," Buck said. "Somebody's going to get seriously injured because of this refusal to wipe the floor."
Yuzuru Inoue was knocked out of the match Sunday when he fell in the first game, but Japanese team officials said they didn't know if a wet spot was to blame. Inoue was expected back for Japan's next match. FIVB president Ruben Acosta defended the ruling, noting that the floor could still be wiped during time-outs and when play is stopped. "It's my opinion that some of the teams sweat too much," Acosta added.
