Luca Vettori spikes during the second set
Foto Trabalza
Trento, February 14th 2018
Report of the match. The starting sixes are a surprise for what concern both the teams; the Polish Champions of Zaksa Kedziezyn-Kozle have to do without the spiker Deroo (out for an ankle strain that occurred on Saturday during last match in PlusLiga) and then it fields Szymura in diagonal with Buszek; the five other players of the starting six are the setter Toniutti, the opposite Torres, the libero Zatorsky and the middle-blockers Wisniewski and Bienek. Trentino Diatec feels the effect of the absence of Hoag (shoulder strain occurred this morning) and so it fields Vettori in diagonal with Giannelli, Lanza and Kovacevic as spikers, Eder and Zingel as middle-blockers, De Pandis and Panda alternating in the libero role. The start of the match is very balanced; the hosts starts in a better way (2-4), but Trento immediately fills the gap with its service and then relies on Lanza to obtain the first important advantage (8-6). After the technical time-out the advantage increases (10-7) thanks to an ace of Kovacevic, but Torres leads almost alone his team to 12-11, before Bienek performs a block on Vettori and gets the tie on 12-12. The match starts being fought point-to-point again (15-15, 17-17); the block of Lanza on Torres gives the right energy for the decisive sprint (20-19), Kovacevic enlarges the gap (22-20) and then defends his advantage (4-22), before that Eder scores the 25-23.
In the second set Zaksa immediately tries to react and succeeds in running away thanks to the good performance of its Puerto Rican opposite (1-5, 3-7); Trentino Diatec, in which Lorenzetti changes Kozamernik (already a scored ace in the previous set) in place of Zingel, doesn’t back down and slowly gets closer also thanks to Vettori (6-9, 9-12). The three-points advantage gets then nullified by Lanza on 14-15 with a great counterattack and an ace of Eder which is worth the 16-16; two consecutive blocks of Kozamernik offer the chance that the yellow-blue were aiming for since the start of the second set (19-18) and force Gardini to ask for a time-out. The final rush is marked by the services of Beniek who on 21-21 manages to create a new gap in favour of the Polish team (21-24), who then close the set already on 22-25.
Everything starts again from the situation of 1-1 at the end of the two sets and Trentino Diatec shows to be absolutely reactive, also from a mental point of view, getting ahead already on 4-2 and then showing a good performance in the whole net area. Zaksa tries to react working very well in both block and defence phases (12-10); Lanza is playing very well tonight and gets his team to +3 (15-12) before defending the advantage (19-16) with the help of a very present Vettori, also in block phase. In the hardest moment of the set Kedzierzyn-Kozle starts playing efficiently again both in block and counterattack phases, reaching the tie on 22-22. The Poles have more energy in the final part of the set and make the most of their third chance to close the set on 27-25 thanks to an ace of Buszek.
The hosting team is up against a wall and starts performing again on high levels in the fourth set, making an attempt to run away already on 4-1 (immediately stopped by the Poles) and then again on 9-6 and 14-10; Lanza is the one to decide the pace, followed by the good yellow-blue service. Gardini decides to make some changes maybe towards the tie break, also because the advantage of Trento keeps increasing (22-19) and nothing worth the last attempt of the hosts to come back until -3 (22-19), because then their service mistakes help Lanza and his teammates to get to the tie-break (25-22).
The fifth set is then the right conclusion of the match and is very balanced until 9-9, with both the teams alternating at the lead, then Trento lose some focus in the block phase with Giannelli and Kozamernik (12-9). This not, however, the decisive moment, because the Poles nullify the match balls (from 14-11 to 14-14) and at the second occasion make the most of an error of Lanza to close the match (15-17).
Trentino Volley Srl
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