Men's NVL Firsts Vs. City of Preston
Sunday 26th October 2008
The University of Birmingham men’s national league first team continued their season on Sunday 26th October with the away trip to City of Preston. With the match beginning at 1100 the team set off at 0830 from the university in a fairly early start. Birmingham, with only 7 players, arrived at the venue determined to get into a run of form to put together a promotion push. However with a squad of only seven players and with four of those players having been involved in the University of Birmingham versus Aston University BUCS match the previous Wednesday, they knew this would not be any easy day.
First up was City of Preston. With a young and somewhat inexperienced team Birmingham realised that Preston may pose some problems and were not proven wrong. A slow start in the first set meant that the guys lost the first set 21-25 despite coach Anton Dimitrov’s best efforts in using his one substitute wisely. With a nervous atmosphere running through the team and with the team evidently dejected after the set loss it was up to the experienced players to change this mentality. Tomasz Hirt and Tomasz Tomsack were those two players and after words of encouragement and a visibly improved team spirit the Birmingham boys set upon opening a lead in the second set thanks to some powerful hitting from JB Grobert on the outside and some all round team defence. Birmingham easily closed out the set 25-17 with Preston seemingly overwhelmed by JB Grobert’s attack. However the negative spirit re-emerged in the third set which not only saw Birmingham heads drop but Preston begin to believe again and some inconsistency on attack saw Preston take a close set 25-22. Again following the change of ends Birmingham came back strong and thanks to some powerful attacks on the wings again got a lead and saw out the fourth set 25-19. A close opening to the fifth set saw Birmingham reach the turnaround 2 points up and after some good setting from Carl Butcher and good all round team work Birmingham won the set 15-11 and took the match in 5 sets.
Following the tough five set match the Birmingham boys were visibly drained and needed to pick themselves up for a match against unknown quantities York VC – new to the division this year. In the warm up coach Dimitrov identified the potential threats York posed and Birmingham were able to open up a large points gap early on in the set and go onto win it comfortably 25-11. However, in the second set Birmingham appeared to lose concentration and despite Dimitrov’s best efforts in using time outs and substitutions the Birmingham team went on to lose the set 19-25 after York’s two main hitters began to find their power and started winning a lot of points for their team. Following the disappointment of the second set Birmingham realised they could not afford to get into another 5 set match as everybody was beginning to tire and with no substitutes this was a potential problem. Following Grobert’s rest in the second set he was able to return in the third and overpower the defence of York and with some blocks coming from both middles and consistent hitting from the two Polish players Birmingham were able to see out the set 25-18 to take a 2-1 lead. However, the job was still not done and again York were able to reply well taking a lead in the forth set. However despite the Birmingham players being tired they were able to dig deep and win the fourth set 25-23 and leave the Preston venue with two wins and hopefully the springboard to start a promotion push.
Results:
UBVC 3-2 City of Preston (21-25, 25-17, 22-25, 25-19, 15-11)
UBVC 3-1 York VC (25-11, 19-25, 25-18, 25-23)
Team: Carl Butcher, Anton Dimitrov, Tomasz Hirt, Tomasz Tomczak, Kieron Bradley, Jean-Baptiste Grobert, Peter Nash.
Match Facts
Competition: EVA National League Division IIIN.
Played: Away.
Result: Won 3-2.
Set Scores: 25-21, 17-25, 25-22, 19-25, 11-15.