The first inter club league game took place on Saturday - with both ladies teams in opposition. For Riga Ladies II, the past few weeks have been an opportunity to regroup and really focus on putting on a stronger performance in 2004. The team has been bolstered by the arrival of new middle hitter, Anna, and with Steph's departure to Birmingham, Anna slotted straight into the starting 6 for this derby game.
The team took a while to settle, and then our tactics for countering the Riga I strong attack started to pay dividends. Our 3-man block produced several winning blocks, including consecutive points against the powerful hitters. This clearly enhanced the team’s confidence and we upped the level of our play in the second half of the set. We lost it 25-13 and looked for a more confident performance in set 2.
The second set saw Riga play let down by poor passing of the first ball, giving setters Ginny and Clare little chance to bring the attackers into play. We did show good fight and determination with some cracking rallies and strong blocking from Anna and Sharon continued to be the highlight of our play. Set 2 was lost 25-14 and so we looked for a good performance in set 3.
This set was point for point until 8-8 and then our first pass went walk about again. A time out allowed the team to refocus, and we opted for all out attack in the 2nd half of the set. A gutsy passage of play saw the team win a good string of points, the noise level was pretty loud and confidence was at its highest. We couldn't quite match Riga I's attack and the set was lost 25-15.
