We played our first semifinal playoff Saturday night, and it was a late affair due to some scheduling issues at the Stadionhal. Even though it was late, it was easily the largest crowd I've seen for a volleyball match in Denmark, and my hat goes off to our fans for making a great atmosphere to play in.
Before the match even started, we got the bad news that Kesse wouldn't be able to play, so Jens started for him and played well, getting a couple blocks and good kills as the opposite. We made a lot of mistakes and gave up a run of about five points in the beginning of the set that put us in quite a hole. We went on a run of our own a bit later in the set and narrowed the gap, but Middelfart ran off a few points again and finished us off comfortably, 21-25.
The start of the second set saw Kesse's shoulder loosen up a bit and he was able to come in for us. We played much better from the beginning, and I think we shook off whatever jitters or nerves were troubling us in the first set. We sided out solidly and were able to contain their opposite fairly well. We were definitely in the drivers seat in this one, but we had some trouble in reception that let them back in it, and a couple stupid mistakes at the net at the end wound up costing us. They took the set 26-28.
The third set started off 4-0 in our favor and was close until about the midway point, when Middelfart began to pull away. They sided out well and their opposite won nearly every ball in transition. We didn't serve well enough to pressure them much and they ended up winning the set 20-25.
Most winning streaks come to an end at some point, and in all honesty this loss wasn't earth-shattering or heart-breaking by any stretch of the imagination. We know why we lost and what we need to do to fix it. We made a lot of mental errors that were reminiscent of our play several months ago, but I don't think that it's indicative of us taking any steps backwards; we just had a bad day.
Despite that, we still did a lot of things well in the match. It was one of our best defensive efforts in recent memory, which allowed us to counter-attack well and earn some points. Still, our overall level was definitely a step below where it has been for the last seven matches, and in the early going it almost seemed like we were trying to do too much. We showed our potential in flashes, so it will simply be a matter of remembering to take a deep breath when things get too hectic. Hopefully the loss can serve as a motivation and refocus us for the remaining games of the season. Luckily our team seems to relish being the underdog, so I don't think we'll have any problem going into Middelfart in a "do-or-die" type situation.
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