Katowice, Poland

At 8.07 PM only two colours are present inside the Spodek Hall (means UFO). Try to imagine 11.000 aliens dressed in red and white (the colours of Poland) supporting their athletes, isn't funny? In that moment Poland and France have started a stunning game.
Everybody knows that the most spectacular fundamental in Volleyball is defense and both teams played great and spectacular digs. The first game ended 38-36!
In the very long final of that set, Poland and France seemed to play cat and mice, but it was not possible to recognize who was the cat and who the mice. Both teams made plenty of silly errors, giving a lot of opportunities to the opponents. Referees made a mistake on 31-30 and, few points later, a line attack of Swiderski decided the first game. The team of Blain (the French coach) is used to play tough matches and it never gives up, and today they have kept on playing. The team of Lozano, on the other hand, badly resigned to play when they were leading by 16 to 13 and ended up by loosing 19-25!
With such a result, by that time the match seemed to be finished. But then Lozano replaced three tired players with Bakiewicz, Gruzska and Szymansky. They gave back energy and confidence to the Polish team and the match ended 15-11 in the fifth set.
For France a big regret: Frantz Granvorka, the best receiver and the most terrific spiker, had injured his back and therefore he could not be part of the match.


Why Poland won: in the first set both teams spent plenty of energy, but only Lozano had the chance to use back up players.


Bye bye andrea zorzi

Katowice, Poland

One year after, Brazil and Bulgaria open again the World League Final Round. Last year, in Moscow, Bulgaria destroyed the Brazilian team, which was distracted and too little concentrated. Bernardinho tried in all ways to wake up his team, which seemed a sleepy lion. His shouts, leaps and scolding weren’t enough.
That Brazil awoke the day after, just in time to get in the final and won the fourth World League in a row, with a spectacular match against France.
This year the Brazilian team arrived in Katowice very determined and, in the last trainings, have hardly tried  to defend the sharp angle attack. This could be the most dangerous weapon of powerful Bulgarian spikers.
At the beginning the match was marked by so many mistakes. The ability of Brazil to change serve (even slow but different), the Bulgarian sluggishness and an emotional break of Giba and his teamate have decided the first and second set (one each).
Then, the two coaches (Martin Stoev and Bernardinho) tried to increase the speed of the game and they used the back up opposite hitters (Iordanov and Andrè) replacing V. Nikolov and Anderson. Both wanted to give priority to the speed more than to the power.
But the game was decided in the fifth set, still characterized by many errors and by a clumsy rhythm. At this low pace Brazil is unrecognizable and Bulgaria exploits all their chances, taking advantage of the young players called in the last two set (Ananiev and Nikolay Nikolov).
The sleepy Brazilian lion didn’t wake up in time and Bulgaria can now enjoy another victory against Brasil, one year after.

Why Bulgaria won: it was a well-balanced match, but not stunning. The skilled spike of Iordanov in the fifht set (not only powerful, but also very smart) was crucial.

Bye Bye andrea zorzi