Prosport NVL Division One, 24th September 2005
Warwick Riga 3 Tameside 0 (25-23 25-17 25-17)
| Riga entered into this, their first fixture of the new season, with a fair degree of confidence. Riga's attacking play, if on song, had always posed problems for Tameside even with their brilliant defensive play. Unfortunately the home side were missing England Juniors, Laura Hodgkinson and Rachael Turner, who were away playing in Norway, which meant that Jules had to step up to the challenge as off-setter so the team played minus a libero. | |
|
The first set was a tight run affair with Riga demonstrating a few nerves early
on. Alex, in her Riga debut, struggled initially to find her timing at 4, but at
6ft 2" still penetrated the small Tameside block time after time. Sally,
returning back to her native middle position, connected well with Lisa, as did
Nicky, causing all sorts of problems as the opposition struggled to defend the
quick attacks. Riga managed to hang on and clinch the set to 23. Defensively Riga put in a solid performance with Nicky and Jules in particular handling the renowned hard serving from Tameside. The girls relaxed into the game and started to play with a lot more confidence and control. Kelly began to get her eye in at 4 and hit some blistering line balls to which the opposition had no answer. Tameside had a taste of their own medicine as Jules had a run of serves giving Riga a comfortable lead which they capitalised on taking the second set to 17. |
 Jules Bromell: stood in as off-setter |
| The third set went pretty much the same way. Tom saw no reason to make any changes and risk upsetting the rhythm. Everyone put in a solid performance and Riga never looked in trouble. "This was a good run out today" Tom said at the end of the match "We've now got Malory and Polonia to look forward to so will have to step up our game big time in order to do ourselves justice". | |
Liz Young