LIFE, it seems, is more than a beach when it comes to volleyball these days and it is the nation’s indoor players who are jumping up and down with a frenzied sense of excitement.

Since London won the right to host the 2012 Olympics, the more established arm of the sport — or, to some, the older, uglier sister — has been handed proper funding and, with it, the opportunity to leap into the big time.

While the leading nations such as Brazil, Russia and China contest the women’s World Championships in Japan next week, the England Volleyball Association is set to unveil the coaches who are expected to lead Great Britain towards a bright, new dawn.

“It’s all very hush-hush, but we know it’s going to be a top foreign coach,” Lucy Wicks, who has been England’s playmaker for the past five years, said. “The barriers we’ve faced in the past are suddenly being removed and there are loads of plans in the pipeline. It’s an exciting time to be a volleyball player.”

A Britain squad will be selected and its players invited to join a full-time training programme. “That’s likely to be in Sheffield,” Wicks, who is in the final year of her second degree, studying physiotherapy at King’s College, London, said. “I would love to be selected, but it would have to wait until the summer because I’d be mad to chuck in my degree so close to the finish.”

For the moment, Wicks, 24, is happy to concentrate on helping her club, London Malory, to challenge for domestic honours and this weekend she will return to her roots with a match against Wessex. “I grew up in Poole and joined Wessex, the local club, when I was 15,” Wicks said. “That’s quite old to be starting, but they had a brilliant youth development set-up, so I was lucky.”

Not so fortunate, though, is that England’s star setter is a mere 5ft 7in tall. “The setter is the one who pulls the strings and drives the tactics and having height is a definite advantage,” Wicks said. “Many setters are over 6ft and their job is to set up the combinations and decide which hitter is going to hit where. It means you’re constantly involved in the game, although most wouldn’t realise how much the setter does.”

Tournament statisticians certainly do and, in January last year, Wicks’s skill was evident in Sheffield, where the qualifying tournament for the World Championship was being held. “That tournament was probably my career-high so far,” she said. “We beat teams that on paper were supposed to be much better than us and I ended up as the top setter in the stats.”

Despite that, England do not have a world or European ranking. “We’ve never been able to afford to go to the competitions where you get those ranking points,” Wicks said. “In the past, accommodation at our training camps was literally sleeping on the sports hall floor. Each season costs the players thousands of pounds and, of course, that’s held us back. I’m fortunate because my parents have helped me out.”

While physiotherapy is her long-term goal, Wicks said she has set her sights on competing in the Olympics in 2012.

“Even if I don’t make that, I’ll be giving my all in the build-up to it. The indoor game is being given a wonderful opportunity. It’s up to us to make the most of it.”

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