KATHMANDU: The Asian Volleyball Confederation has agreed to bar Nepal and India from the 21st Asian Senior Women's Volleyball Championship slated for August 29 to September in the Philippines.

"The AVC sent us a letter stating that the organisers were not able to include teams from Nepal and India due to the severity of coronavirus' new variant in our region," said the Nepal Volleyball Association in a release.

"We are hurt as the AVC barred us from taking part in the biggest event saying that Nepal and India fell under the most affected areas from the new variant of COVID-19," the NVA added.

"We were excited as we were taking part in such a big tournament for the first time and we had been preparing well," the NVA said. The NVA also cancelled the closed-camp training of the national team.