East Midlands Volleyball League
Saturday 16th March 2019 Ashfield Vipers 1 3 Leicester Athena 0 (27-25, 25-15, 25-5) Athena's regional league team may have lost to Vipers 1, but they showed signs of how good they are going to be in a tremendous first set. Athena started with Eli setting, Ioana as opposite, Marta and Sam as middle players and Algi and Edyta as outside hitters. And they started with a bang! The energy, commitment, teamwork was outstanding as they took the game to a very good Ashfield Vipers 1 team. Their plan to suffocate Vipers' dangerous attack worked as they blocked all cross court attacks, forcing Vipers to work harder to win points. As the set came to the end, though, Vipers showed their experience and began to claw back and only hit the lead in the final few points as they won 27-25. After such a close set, Athena were clearly a little deflated but they kept within a couple of points with Vipers through the first half of the second set. A strong serving set from Sewell pulled Vipers ahead as Athena started to make mistakes in the service receive. Alessandra came on for Ioana as opposite but Athena could not turn it round and lost the second 25-15. Alessandra stayed on for Ioana and Amanda came on for Marta but Athena fell 12-0 down at the start of the third set as they struggled to return Smith's serves. Milly then came on for Sam but that was the set and match over as Vipers closed things out 25-5. Despite the result, the first set showed that this inexperienced Athena team can play high quality volleyball and they will improve as they continue to gel together. Well done to Marta for her second MVP nomination in 7 days, well deserved for her good serving, big blocks and smart hitting.
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