Goalball is the only Paralympic female team sport for blind and visually impaired athletes, and is played by teams of three using a 1.25kg ball with bells inside on a court the size of a volleyball court.
The aim is to score by rolling the ball into the opposition goal, while the opposition attempts to block the ball with their bodies.
The GB women only had their place at the London Games confirmed in March 2012 and they went on to reach the quarter-finals where they lost on a ‘golden goal’ to eventual bronze medallists Sweden.
Their displays in front of sell-out crowds at the Copper Box earned the team a £1m award from UK Sport for the next Paralympic cycle, up from the £0.5m that the men and women jointly received prior to London, but the financial reward means more pressure is on the women’s team as they prepare for the European A Championships in Turkey,, external the first step on the road to Rio 2016, which start on Monday.
Bullen will be joined in the team by fellow London Paralympians Jessica Luke and Anna Tipton, as well as newcomers Emma Jones, Laura Perry and Brittany Stead.
It is also the first major international tournament with new coach Jackie Sheldon who is new to goalball, having come from a rugby background. But Bullen believes it has given the team a fresh outlook.
“It was a bold move to appoint someone who hadn’t got a background in goalball but Jackie has spent a lot of time looking at footage from other countries and our assistant coach Emily Luke is a former player so we have different minds coming together on the coaching team to find what is best for us,” she explains.