Riga played host to local rivals Leic this weekend - a rematch of their first game of the season. It may have been a rematch but the Warwick side had a different look from the 1st encounter with only 2 of the starters from the previous match starting this one.
Riga started brightly with a run of serves from Andy Collins which gave Riga a 5-0 start. Unfortunately Riga then proceeded to lose the advantage with a similar run of serves from Leic. This was to be Riga's down fall all day with the team losing big runs of points with a serve receive that wasn't functioning at its best. The team traded points with Leicester till 11 all with Steve Beasley blocking and hitting well through the middle until another run of serves cost Riga 5 further points and ultimately the set.
The second set again started well for Riga, who were playing with their captain Tom Spijkers feeling under the weather, until 5-5 when a run of 9 serves this time from Leicester gave them a commanding lead. Riga never gave up though and excellent middle play from Naz Unar and hitting from Ivan Spisso meant Riga went into the 3rd set with some hope.
This time Riga started slowly and the pressure was starting to tell. Riga quickly went behind and coach Andy Collins decided to rest the sick Tom Spijkers and brought on Tom Young Jnr. For some reason this kick started the team, maybe as people realised they had to work themselves and not rely on their captain, and the passion and effort missing in the first 2 sets returned. The team started to fight for every point and soon had Leicester in all sorts of trouble. soon a 6 point deficit became a 24 -20 lead. Unfortunately though Leicester showed their championship potential and dug deep and soon levelled. Tom Spijkers was brought back into the fray but unfortunately Leicester couldn't be stopped and the set was conceded 26-24.
Despite the loss the team has to be upbeat that when we play at our best we can match most teams but to beat them we have to be playing at our best for the whole game. The team is improving and it was good to see the blocking we worked on in training having an effect in the game.
Next up for Riga is Loughborough Uni on the 1st Dec at home which will be another hard game especially without captain Tom.
MVP - Steve Beasley
