Coming back from the holiday we were ready to give the teams we had been beaten by before a run for their money. First up was Gislaved, an away game at their house. With 2 weeks of training under our belt we were ready. There was nothing more we could have done to prepare ourselves for that match. We took the first set from them but that was all. Unfortunately we lost in 4 sets. It seemed Gislaved caught on to our game plan and executed theirs better. We could have taken them to a 5th set but it was a little to late for us.
Match two was against Sollentuna. They had recently lost one outside and libero but had brought on a bunch of lower level players to pick up the slack. They put up a good fight and were tough in defense but in the 5th set we prevailed and won! It was a great feeling although I don't think we needed to take it to a 5th set. We could have finished them off in 4 for sure. But we did what we had to do in a tough situation and over came. I was very proud of the team that night and excited that Jet (our new setter) was able to get a win on her first home game.
Match three was up against Ljungby. A division one team who qualified to get into the league last year. They have a really good middle, an outside that if there is no one up on her can make points and thats pretty much it. They are not a strong passing team if there is any sort of serve pressure on them and they are also not that great of a blocking team, if you dont hit directly in their block. Defense wise, if you hit right to them they will get it up but if not its a struggle. So we went into the match feeling good about our chances against them. I was excited because I knew what we had to do to beat them and so did everyone else. We won the first set pretty easily, only letting them in a little. The second set was not very good but once again it was little things that we had to do in order to win, they were not doing anything special. We were following the game plan which was to get the good middle out of the hitting line up and to get them off balance. However they took the next 2 sets off us winning in 4 sets. We gave them the match. We were the better team in this situation, but we ended up making to many mistakes and dropping the serve pressure in the end. The chance for a turn around was to late.
We have talks in the locker room after the match and everyone was disappointed more because we all knew that we should have won that game. It was right in front of us. I mentioned during the talk that we need to stop waiting for points to be given to us and instead take them from the other team. No one is going to give us anything in this sport or any other sport for that matter. We need to stop playing safe and to go for it. At least at the end of a match, where we all knew we really went for it, we wouldn't be as disappointed in losing. In the Sollentuna game, there was a sense of fighting on the court. Last night when it was down to the last couple points, it felt as if we had been there a million times and that was just what was supposed to happen to us. It was routine. We can't be afraid of losing because then all we will do, is lose. Something needs to change within all of us on the team, we need to stop waiting for someone else to do our job and to just go for it. What have we got to lose really? INGET. I'm not going to give up, there is still a lot more season to go. So lets get to it then!
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