Match Report

Oxford WNVL vs Reading Aces

Date:
03 Oct 2010
Location:
Kendrick School, Reading
Result:
1-3 (29-27, 21-25, 19-25, 7-25)
MVP:
Michaela Lukesova
Players:
Cecilia Izzo (setter), Kath Nolan (opposite), Ketlin Varkki (opposite), Claire Churchhouse (outside), Jana Orszaghova (outside), Cristina Messaggi (outside), Michaela Lukesova (middle), Sam Vermaak (middle; captain), Milene Mastroianni (libero), plus Jon Williams (Coach) and Corne Vermaak (assistant coach)

Comments

"

We expected Reading to be a good opposition and so it proved, although in reality it was our own poor, and at times completely abysmal, play that allowed Reading the 1-3 victory in this match.

Things started a bit shakily as OUVC lost their first point on serve and then failed to put together a front court attack for the first half of the set, but the team gradually sorted out the early kinks and kept fairly level with Reading, only allowing the opposition to take a slight lead towards the close of the set. At 19-22 it was now or never for the set, and Oxford suddenly picked up our level to play the best volleyball of the match, pulling back to 23-23 and, after some hard-fought rallies and extremely impressive hitting, clawed a set-win at 29-27, much to the elation of our team.

Oxford’s spirits were running high but sadly the start of the second set soon brought us crashing back to Earth as Reading’s best server promptly wiped the floor with our passers; fortunately she finally served out at 6-0 to give us our first point of the set. Oxford continued to play very inconsistently but, luckily, Reading were having passing problems of their own, so the score stayed with Oxford just lagging a few points behind. The bad start to the set eventually proved fatal and Reading closed the set 21-25.

OUVC woke up somewhat for the third set and managed to grab a slight initial lead. At 15-13, however, our serving nemesis took further revenge on our passers enabling Reading to take the lead 15-22. Oxford’s confidence and teamwork never really recovered and the team proceeded to pretty much fall apart at the seams, leaving Reading, the substantially more consistent team, to cruise to a fairly easy win of 19-25.

The less said of the final set the better, to be frank. It was the worst I have seen our team play in the two years I’ve been with the team. Pretty much nothing was working and team morale had completely nose-dived and did not recover. Reading pulled an easy 7-25 set-win that they really didn’t have to work for at all.

I think it’s best just to chalk this match up to experience. A number of reasons (such as the lack of commitment to training recently & missing team members on the day) certainly played their part in our poor performance, but these are in no way a full excuse for our extremely disappointing level of volleyball. I think the main problem was simply in our heads and that everyone’s confidence levels dipped dramatically and very early on in the match; we need to learn to fight in all sets like we did in the first set. This match was a good wake-up call that we need to step up to Div 2 standards – and there were certainly positives in our performance; our hitting for instance was actually very good and we won the vast majority of front court attacks that we made. We also had only a few serve errors, which was excellent. We now know the areas we need to work on, and I’m confident that at our re-match against Reading later in the season we will put on a much better show.

On a final note, well done to Michaela for being voted MVP despite playing only her 2nd match as middle! And a huge thank you to Jon for standing in as our coach this weekend.

"

Report by Sam Vermaak

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