The national league team played twice this weekend, at home to South Hants and away to Richmond. Chantelle couldn't make the games as she was on a jolly to Poland, luckily her mum and Craig are more dedicated and still came along to support the team. Agi is on Maternity leave (hope the scan went well) but came along to help out by doing a line. The rest of the team were available for the home game. Hopefully at some point we will be able to get a full team photo, but I don't know when....probably the Christmas meal!
Paulina started her first game for Worthing through the outside with captain Theresa, Em and Brinee were though the middle with Sintija and Mel opposite and setter. Gemma, Amy and newbie Tracy were on the bench along with coaches Dan and Mr Byerley who was making his first bench appearance for Worthing NL!
South Hants had a tall team that looked to dominate the net, happily for Worthing Brinee was matched against their tallest player and while giving away 3 or 4 inches still managed to get strong hands to most balls while putting away some big hits herself.
From the start Worthing dominated through strong serving putting Hants on the back foot. Paulina stepped into the serve receive with Trees and Sintija pretty seamlessly and good balls in gave the setter options. Some communication issues still need to be resolved, but it was good to see the team try and implement what they have been working on in practice.
Gemma came on at the end of the first two sets and although not confident going on, she made a positive impact and started the third set for Em. Tracy came on to set for the final two sets in place of Mel linking up well with local team mate Paulina and Emma through the middle.
The third set started positively with Worthing building a comfortable lead again off the back of strong serving from Brinee, Paulina and Sintija. Gemma in the process of running in for a quick attack through the middle slipped, which had everyone concerned, although she bounced straight back with a grin it seemed to cause the team to lose focus for a couple of points, before rallying and finishing professionally to win 3-0.
The first home tea of the season was pretty good with traditional Latvian goodies, which were scoffed down along with the standard cakes (no home made ginger cake though!), sandwiches, fruit etc although Nigel was a little disappointed that Em had hidden the crisps!
The team were very keen to start against Richmond on Sunday and due to a slight technical issue were two hours early rather than the standard one! On the plus side we got to watch a good game between Richmond men's second team against Norwich, their juniors were impressive and even pulled off a textbook pancake for the crowd!
Amy and Gemma couldn't make this game so we were down to the starting six from Saturday along with Tracy, who started setting. A solid first set saw Worthing control the game for long spells, although Richmond had a ever say die attitude and picked up a number of balls Worthing thought they had finished. The first set saw Trees put away a nicely run b ball and Sintija ran a crossover that went narrowly wide (no complaints about the communication there - the call could be heard back in Worthing!!) off a good pass in from Paulina. Sintija also pulled off a sneaky dump off the second ball that is becoming a trademark move for her!
In the second set Mel smoothly came on for Tracy and set well finding the middles and getting balls out to the ariel for Trees! Paulina kept her focus and even with a timeout called she kept serving her usual strong float causing difficulties for the Richmond serve receive. Worthing build a lead they didn't look like giving up.
In the second set Mel smoothly came on for Tracy and set well finding the middles and getting balls out to the ariel for Trees! Paulina kept her focus and even with a timeout called she kept serving her usual strong float causing difficulties for the Richmond serve receive. Worthing build a lead they didn't look like giving up.
Richmond in the third set came out stronger with their outside hitter finding the line constantly and the number 16 middle dominating the early exchanges. A couple of minor tactical adjustments the coach should have mentioned earlier resolved this and the team fought back narrowly dropping the set. Mark will be upset we got caught out by an early short serve, which had Trees scrambling, while she got a hand to it, there was no way to recycle it. Em kept head 19-16 down tipping into the space at 4 when they had a double block on her to get Worthing a point and serve, but they couldn't quite claw back the initiative and lost the set
Keen to avoid the lottery of a fifth set Worthing wanted to finish professionally and Brinee started this with her bullet serve, after three or four of these a short serve was thrown in for an ace, which the team all appreciated! The Farley's continued to linked up well with Brinee setting Trees for a change and what a beautiful ball it was..... Trees took full advantage spiking a clean winner into the gap. Paulina not to be out done was hitting well testing the block and getting points from some good angled shots. In the end Worthing controlled the majority of the game with their serving and serve receive to edge the win. "That's the way aha aha I like it"!
Choosing an MVP for Richmond was tough, in the end it came down to the number 16 through the middle and the setter - the setter edged it. For Worthing our captain (Trees) picked up her first MVP of the season - well played!
Worthing are back in action next weekend away to Essex.
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