Newmarket Volleyball Club

Mens National League 3E
Sunday 13th January 2008

v
Tonbridge
Cambridge

Newmarket were clearly the slower team to start, with a less than impressive warm-up. The first set was like the proverbial see-saw going point for point very early on. It was only then that Newmarket started to play some good volleyball and they showed their dominance, particularly through the middle. Tonbridge without their main hitter showed their organisation and good defence to win the first set 25-22.

You can't teach class and it was in the second set that this was epitomised as Newmarket's change of attacks and pace saw them take what ended up a more controlled set. Tonbridge continued to battle hard but were undone but some excellent blocking by Rob Dovaston and some powerful hitting by MVP JP Davis.

It was at this point the notorious lack of concentration that NVC have shown throughout the season, reared its ugly head again. Unable to find a first pass or a pressure serve NVC were put to the sword by a ruthless Tonbridge middle hitter who continued to score points all afternoon. 25-13

At this point it seemed like the Dominos had given up, and although changes were brought in to retrieve a good passing unit NVC looked the shadow of the team from the first 2 sets and succumbed to another disappointing defeat. 25-14

MVP - JP Davis

Newmarket Domino made the short trip to Cambridge to face their biggest rivals at Chesterton College. NVC started the first set strongly with setter Ben Child linking up neatly with power hitter Rob Dovaston to ease into a 10-3 lead.

With Peter Storm finally finding his range with his jump serve, CVC had no answer to its variety. They did finally wake up, and excellent setting by Jean Jacket finding the energetic Paul Day in the middle brought the home side back to within 3 points at 19-16. Unfortunately for CVC, Storm had rotated back into serve, and blew away the home side again with his top spin, 25-21 to NVC.

The second set started much the same way with Nik Mezanov replacing JP Davis through the left side. Again CVC worked hard, but this time it was the NVC block that stole the show. Child, Freeman, and especially Dovaston were in an uncompromising mood. When the CVC attackers changed tack and dumped the ball over the block, superb court coverage by Peter Storm and Mezanov rescued the ball from almost impossible positions. The set was taken at a canter, 25-17.

For the third set, NVC rested several of the starting line-up to give squad players Charles Reed and Pete Saunders some much needed experience. It was to prove fruitless, as Reeds setting was consistently read by the blockers, and despite his best defensive efforts, Saunders appeared to be overcome by nerves and the set was conceded to 17.

Back to the premier line up and NVC were no longer in charity mood. The CVC setter Jacket tired, and this allowed Freeman to cement the player of the match award, just edging out Dovaston with another run of blocks. The Storm serve had, by now, run out of puff, but Davis killed the game off with a monster spike to haul NVC off the bottom of National League Division 3East.

MVP - Paul Freeman