Minowa takes on dual role for sister squads Akari and Nxled

Taka Minowa —AUGUST DELA CRUZ

Taka Minowa’s disciplined approach to the game will start to crawl over to the Akari Chargers next season.The Japanese coach was named director of volleyball operations for Akari and Nxled ahead of the 2024 Premier Volleyball League (PVL) season.

Akari made the announcement on Thursday, promoting Minowa, who will still call the shots for the Chameleons while overseeing the Chargers.

The team said that Minowa will take on the role of supervising the volleyball program of the sister teams starting next year.

Akari will soon announce its interim coach with new assistant coaches for the Chargers and the Nxled Chameleons.Minowa, the husband of Japan V.League star Jaja Santiago, showed his impressive and disciplined coaching style in his first PVL season with the Chameleons, who finished ninth out of 12 teams with a 4-7 (win-loss) record.

Minowa was previously part of the coaching staff of the Saitama Ageo Medics—Santiago’s former team—in Japan’s V.League and Liaoning Tengda in China and also worked as an assistant coach for Japan women’s volleyball team, which competed in the 2022 AVC Cup for Women in Manila.

Jorge Souza de Brito resigned after the 2023 season amid his best finish in the PVL with a 5-6 record in seventh place of the second All-Filipino Conference.

The Brazilian coach has been the coach of the Chargers since they joined the PVL in the 2022 Reinforced Conference and compiled an 11-21 (win-loss) record in four conferences in the PVL. INQ