Last weekend, Nottingham Rockets hosted another tournament, this time for juniors. There were two categories: Under-14s and Under-17s.
Athena took four teams: two for each category. Because most of the Athena players had only started playing this summer and they were up against mixed teams, Coach Paul had been playing down expectations amongst his very excited squad. He knew they would be playing against some very experienced players. Under-17s In the Under-17 category, both teams decided to ignore the coach's view that they would get beaten and won their opening matches. They did that by working incredibly hard, supporting each other and serving well. For both teams, this was their first ever taste of playing 6v6 competitive volleyball and their first chance to try out playing a 6-2 rotation in a match ... but none of that phased them as they showed great tenacity and skill. As the day wore on, they played teams such as Darkstar and Riga who were clearly much more experienced and extremely well coached. Their power and skill level showed the Athena teams the level they have to get to and acted as an inspiration ... although I am not sure the players were feeling that inspired as they were getting beaten. By the end of the day, Athena 1 finished 6th and Athena 2 finished 9th out of 9 ... but that doesn't matter. What mattered was these girls grew. They bonded together, they had a fabulous time and they will learn so much from the experience. Under-14s The Under-14s played 4v4 volleyball on half courts. Both teams started nervously and lost a couple of matches. But once they calmed down and remembered that this was the same as training, that they could volley and dig and serve, they started to put in some really impressive performances. Darkstar were miles better than any other team in the Under-14s, but Athena 1 and 2 came out second and third out of 6 teams. Athena 1 were the youngest team by far, Athena 2 had some very inexperienced players, but they showed real grit. Thank yous Firstly, a huge thank you to Bryan from Nottingham Rockets for organsing the tournament. Managing 15 teams acors two competitions is no mean feat and he deserved his evening beers. And a big thank you to the parents who came along to support and help, including Christine, Kavita and to Kathy who coached Athena 2 under-14s all day long. Your time and enthusiasm was very much appreciated.
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Nottingham Rockets hosted a pre-season tournament for regional league teams in the East Midlands. Athena sent two teams, one made upof NVL players plus three juniors and one made up of regional league players. Here is what the respective captains had to say: Charlie captained the regional league squad: "Athena 1 sported a new team at the Nottingham Adult Grand Prix this year, with Charlie setting, Ioana as opposite, Alex, Anna and Sam as middles and Maria and Eve as outsides. The first two matches were extremely tough. Going up against some very experienced players in other mixed teams - we lost our first two matches. We struggled with some high level serving from our opposition. Despite this, we did show some flashes of fabulous 3 touch volleyball. After so long without playing, it was only to be expected that people would be rusty and Athena struggled in the next couple of matches= but bounced back later in the day to win. With our first win, everyone relaxed more, and our last match was much more fun, despite not winning the last game. All in all, it was a good experience for us despite the losses. It helped to pin-point the areas we need to work on as a team to help us improve and play better together." Sarah captained the Athena NVL squad:
"On the 11th September, Athena’s NVL team brought a team to the Nottingham Rockets Adult tournament – however this was a new team for Athena to enter. We had new adult players of Kristina and Jess join us who have been training with us for a few months now, but we also brought 3 juniors: Chiara, Rahel and Izzy. They joined with previous Athena NVL players of Sarah, Michelle, Algi, Petra, and Paulina, we forged one great team and introduced part of our new look squad to the county. We started off with the first 2 matches going successfully, winning 31-26 and 33-16 respectively. There were admittedly a few errors on our side, however the team cohesiveness only improved with time and experience. As we had 3 setters on the team, Coach Steve kept swapping players in/out to ensure everyone was able to play as much as each other, and this didn’t seem to affect the ability and scoring power of the team which was positive to see. At the halfway point of the tournament, we were moved to the other court side, as we had won our first games and were now in the top 4. On this side, we had to adapt to a men’s height net and were now playing against 3 predominantly male teams, with only one or two female players on each team. As the only female team of the tournament, this could have been a daunting experience, particularly for our younger teammates who haven’t experienced much game play yet. However, our skills, tactics, and ability continued, and everyone rose to the challenge. Some real highlights came from this experience – notably Rahel blocking an outside NVL men’s player, and Chiara’s serving weakening the opponent in each game we played. Although we didn’t win the 2 games we faced in the latter half of the tournament, we came 4th overall and Coach Steve seemed suitably impressed and happy with how we played, particularly as we seemed to have improved from our friendly earlier in the week against Coventry & Warwick Riga. This only shows the positive signs for the future!" A bit thank you to Nottignham Rockets for organising the tournament, it was great fun and will be very useful as the teams prepare for the new season. |
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