Men's NVL Firsts Vs. Chester
Sunday 11th October 2009
The men travelled to Chester in good sprits for their first league game of the season, and despite an early start than would normally have been required due to the Birmingham Half Marathon, they were ready for the game.
The first game was against the home team Chester who had opened their league campaign with 2 defeats, however, the team knew that last years league runners up would not be easy opponents. It proved this way in the first set. The Birmingham team managed to keep the opening exchanges tight and were level at 9-9, but the lack of match practice appeared to tell on the team and they let this slip, and following some strong blocking and attacking from Chester, Birmingham lost the set 25-14.
Birmingham were not deterred by the loss of the first set and they entered the second set in high spirits. Once again the early exchanges were tight however Birmingham were able to take a lead following some accurate setting from Carl Butcher and some strong attacking play from Tom Hirt, Tom Tomczak and Nikolay Nikolov. Despite a fight back from Chester, Birmingham were able to see the set out 30-28 and level the match 1-1.
The third set started much the same as the others. The opening exchanges were tight however despite some strong attacking play, Birmingham were not able to penetrate the Chester defences and lost the set 25-18. The fourth set again started out tight however good use of the serve and good coaching from Graham Fowler allowed the Birmingham team to keep the set tight until the end and finally see it out 25-22.
Going into the fifth set the Birmingham team knew that they had lost in 5 sets to Chester last season and that this was not going to be an easy task. As with the previous four sets it was close and at the mid-set change of ends Birmingham were in the lead 8-6, and despite a fight back from Chester and some good use of the attacking options from Butcher Birmingham were able to maintain a slender 13-12 lead. At this point coach Graham Fowler substituted the fatigued Hirt with Lewis Grant at opposite. This proved to be a match winning substitution, as it seemed to distract the Chester team and a great unreturnable first serve by Peter Nash took Birmingham to 14-12 up. Nash followed this up with a good second serve forcing Chester to hit through the outside and the attack was snuffed out by a big Lewis Grant block. This point saw Birmingham win the set 15-12 and, more importantly, the match 3-2.
Match MVP: Tomasz Hirt.
Match Facts
Competition: National League 3N.
Played: Away.
Result: Won 3-2.
Set Scores: 25-14, 28-30, 25-18, 22-25, 12-15.