In a match that almost mirrored last week’s loss to Mallory in everything except the result, Riga beat Polonia to take a much needed home win 3-2.
The game had an international flavour with Polonia fielding two Kiwi’s of their own to counter Riga’s own antipodean. The first set saw both teams taking a while to settle in to the game with points being traded fairly consistently. Riga capitalised on a 5 point run of serves early in the set from Chris Anderson (NZ) to maintain the lead for the set before closing it out with a tight, final score line of 28-26.
The pressure was maintained in the second set by Riga with some excellent blocking from Kees De Hoogh and both middle players, Dan Turnbull and Manuele Monti. Tactical substitutions from Polonia could not stem the flow of Riga points and they conceded the set 25-18.
Polonia held their nerve and showed their fighting spirit in the third set and managed to claw their way back into the match. A strong relationship between setter Ryan Cuthbert and their main hitter Luca Pinter kept them in the lead through out the whole set and allowed them to close it out narrowly by 27-25.
The momentum had well and truly swung back in Polonia’s favour and they started the set strongly. Coach Tom Young was forced to make a substitution and replace Chris Anderson (Eng) with Tomasz Morawski. Even the power hitting of De Hoogh and excellent middle hitting from Monti was not enough to keep Riga in touch, losing the set 25-18.
Stern words from Young and Captain Phil Wyles took there desired effect and Riga started the deciding set with vigour. Taking an early lead and led by more consistent passing from libero Luca Molinari and excellent hitting from Morawski, Riga changed ends with a 3 point advantage which they built on to take the final set and the match 15 – 10.
MVP for Riga was Chris (Kiwi) Anderson and for Polonia was Luca Pinter.
Riga Squad: Chris A (UK), Chris A (NZ), Kees, John, Dan, Phil W, Manuele, Luca, Tomasz
Coach: Tom Young
