Katowice (Poland)

13 July 2007

Watching games as Poland-USA, very balanced and tight as well, though the final results was 3–0, always gives a great pleasure.
Moreover, lots of fans (11.000!) support the teams, all wearing a BIALO-CZERWONI (in Polish it means “white and red”) shirt, scarfs and duck hat.
They are well trained: today, Friday 13th, they sang a song against the misfortune. Smiling, they said that in this day everything could happen!
All together yelled aloud: RAZ, DWA, TRZY (one, two three) just when the players touched the ball.
During the technical time out, on the huge wide screen inside the Spodek Hall, a big red heart called “Kiss Camera” appeared. The Polish television director chose two persons sitting next to each another, at random among the audience, showing them inside the heart on the big screen. The two “elected” had to kiss each other. All of them actually did it, with a great happiness and participation indeed, and when the two displayed were two men or two women, they… hug each other!!
The atmosphere was particularly relaxed because both teams were already qualified for semis (Poland - Brasil and USA - Russia). Poland won because they were very resolute, especially when the game become tough, confirming that Lozano’s team has actually improved a lot in the last 2 years.

Why Poland won: USA team made small mistakes in crucial time and they paid at a high price. Poland took advantage of major consistency.


Now I try to build the “Dream Team” choosing the best fundamentals among the four teams qualified for 2007 World League Semifinal . I’ll pick up the collective skills not individual ability (i.e. Russian serve not Ostapenko serve).

SERVE	RUSSIA
RECEPTION	BRASIL
UNPREDICTABLE SET	BRASIL
ACCURACY SET	POLAND
UNPREDICTABLE SPIKE	BRASIL
POWER SPIKE	RUSSIA
DIG	USA
BLOCK	RUSSIA
MENTAL APPROACH	POLAND
CONSISTENCY	BRASIL

 

Bye bye andrea zorzi

 

Katowice (Poland)

13 July 2007


Julio Velasco, Italian team coach from 1989 to 1996, when we were playing poorly, often used the poker’s player allegory. To be an excellent poker player, it is necessary to cut down loss when you don’t have good cards: be patient, don’t give up and, mostly, avoid to be hurried. I have never played poker, but I know pretty well what means to reduce the damage in volleyball: today’s Brasil game against Russia is a perfect example.
Brasil is well known for Ricardo’s quickest setting, but today that risky feature did not worked out. Bernardinho’s boys can’t slow down their own style of playing, since they would loose their harmony completely. They are used to spike very fast balls and their run up approaching is automatic. They have not time to think, they have to start and they find out the ball in the right spot.
However, Brazilian players didn’t give up and kept on playing also when Russians fully exploited their heights and strengths.
During the second set Murilo (he played his best match I have ever seen) replaced the superstar Giba, who didn’t mourn and kept on supporting his team. Brasilians didn’t manage to find immediately a terrific game, they suffered long but they never lost self-confidence. At a certain moment, their performance changed. They started to get some block, dig several attacks and Russian confidence collapsed. Today’s success was very hard to reach and now Brazil is once more the biggest favourite for final victory.

Otherwise, Russians had wasted a great chance to beat Brasil, confirming that they are able to play only when they have an excellent hand, but you cannot hope to win only relying on best cards.

Why Brasil won: the team never gave up  helped by Murilo's outstanding performance

Bye Bye andrea zorzi