In the 13th round of the Polish Men's Volleyball League (Przlyga), Nysza, ranked 8th in the league and played for by Miyaura Kento, played against Warsaw, ranked 10th, at home on Tuesday, December 6th local time, and lost 1-3 (25-18, 21-25, 15-25, 20-25).
Kento Miyaura came on as an opposite and scored six points, but his performance was not enough to help the team win.
First set starting lineup
Nisa
OH: Gerzhod (Poland), Kwasowski (Poland)
MB: Zerba (Argentina), Abramovic (Poland)
OP: Bentara (Tunisia)
S: Zukowski (Croatia)
L: Dembiec (Poland)
Warsaw
OH: Tilley (France), Szabuk (Poland)
MB: Wrona (Poland), Nowakowski (Poland)
OP: Krawek (Netherlands)
S: Filrey (Poland)
L: Wojtaszek (Poland)
*Positions: OH = outside hitter, MB = middle blocker, OP = opposite, S = setter, L = libero
The stats for this match areHere
Match Report
Early in the first set, Nisa's OP Ventala was blocked by Warsaw's MB Nowakowski, but after that they continued to score spikes with a high success rate.
Warsaw also scored points, mainly from OP Krawek, to make it 6-7, but Nysza managed consecutive breaks with a service ace from S. Zukowski to take a 10-7 lead.
OH Kwasowski's serve then led to three consecutive breaks, including two aces, as Nysza pulled away from Warsaw, 14-8.
Relief server Miyaura, who got a chance at 18-12, also wanted to ride this momentum, but his serve was a mistake.
However, towards the end of the match OH Kwasovski scored another service ace to make the score 21-16, and Nisa's momentum continued as they continued to attack with their serves and OP Ventala scored some solid spikes.In the end, OH Gerjot scored a goal after OP Ventala dug the ball with his foot, and Nisa took the set 25-19.
In the second set, OH Kwasowski again took a service ace from Warsaw early on, but Warsaw, in turn, shook up Nysa's reception with their serve, varying the speed, and from there they scored points with spikes from OH Tiri and other plays to extend their lead to 4-7.
Nisa tried to catch up with a spike from OH Gerdzhot and a long-awaited service ace, but Warsaw widened the gap to 10-15 with a block from MB Nowakowski and a spike from OP Krawek.
After that, Warsaw's three outside players continued to score points with high decisiveness and their serves were also effective, so they maintained their lead. Finally, MB Vrona scored a spike to give Warsaw the lead at 21-25.
In the third set, both teams traded side outs in the early stages, but Nisa continued to take a one-step lead at 9-8.
However, immediately afterwards, Warsaw took the lead at 9-12 with consecutive blocks from OH Tili on a serve from OH Szalbuk, and continued to break with spikes from OH Szalbuk and other plays to extend their lead to 12-17.
Nisa sent OP Miyaura, S Szczurek, and OH El Graoui onto the court in an attempt to change the flow of the game, but Warsaw's ace from OP Kravek and OH El Graoui were caught in the opponent's block consecutively, which only widened the point gap.In the end, OH Tiri's spike was successful, and Warsaw took the set with ease, 15-25.
In the fourth set, OP Ventala scored an ace early on to try to bring the momentum back to his team, but OH Szalbuk scored consecutive spikes to give Warsaw a 4-7 lead.
Furthermore, OP Ventara made a mistake and was blocked, resulting in consecutive spikes that led to Warsaw's lead being extended to 8-13, so Nisa brought on OP Miyaura again to replace OP Ventara.
OP Miyaura showed great decisiveness, but with ace hits from OH Szabuk, Warsaw was able to extend their lead to 12-20.
In the final stages, OP Miyaura served with all his might, scoring two consecutive breaks, including an ace of his own, to bring the score to 18-22, but this was the end of Nisa's counterattack.
In the end, reliever server OH El Graoui made an error on his serve, and Warsaw, who had won the set 20-25, defeated Nysza 1-3.
MVP: OP Niels Krawek (17 points (2 on serve), attack success rate 68%)
Miyaura scored 6 points (1 on serve) with an attack success rate of 561 TP and 3 T.
With this, Nisa is now in provisional 10th place with a total of 6 wins, 8 losses and 20 points.
The next match will be against Lviv, who are in 14th place, away from home on Tuesday, December 13th at 8:30pm local time (4:30am Japan time).
*Lviv is a Ukrainian team, but they are currently competing in the Polish league. However, their home games are played in Krakow, Poland.
Thoughts etc.
On this day, we were there to watch and report on the event!
Even though it was a weekday, the game started at 4:15pm, which was quite early, and it was raining outside, so when I spoke to Miyaura-kun during the warm-up he made a pessimistic comment about the attendance that day, saying "It seems like there won't be many people there today..." (laughs).
However, just before the game started, there were already quite a few spectators in the stadium.
To be precise, there were 1,050 customers inside, and although the clientele was certainly heavily weighted towards elderly people who were likely retired, I felt that having over 1,000 customers inside was typical of Poland.
For starters, you hardly ever see any grandparents at volleyball venues in Japan, so I was reminded just how widely the entertainment of watching volleyball has spread to a wide range of people in Poland, and how much the Star Nysa club is loved by the locals.
Miyaura's warm-up pairing for the day was with Zelva.
He is a middle blocker for the Argentine national team, is the same age as Miyaura, and also started playing in the Polish league this year. The two have a lot in common, including being both foreigners who don't speak Polish, which may be why they get along so well.
Our opponent that day, Warsaw, is a team with a strong roster that boasts five current and former Polish national team players, as well as foreign player OH Tille (son of the current Panasonic Panthers manager) who played for France and won the Tokyo Olympics.
Nisa had suffered three straight losses so far and was in a tough situation, so this was a game they really wanted to win.
My wish was granted in the first set, as Nisa's serve was explosive and they overwhelmed Warsaw.
At the beginning of the season, Nisa was a team that was being bombarded with serves by their opponents, but they were able to hit their opponents with even more powerful serves and win matches. However, recently this trait of being a team with a strong serving team has been disappearing, so when I saw Nisa attacking with their serves right in front of me, I almost cried...
They have particularly had a tough run of losses over the last three games, and the games I recently saw in person against Zabierce and Rzeszow were crushing 0-3 defeats, so seeing the Nysa players so lively in the games right in front of me just made me think, "good for you all" (laughs).
It's safe to say that the first set was a perfect match, except for a miss by reliever Miyaura.
But this didn't last.
More than in the first set, Warsaw continued to target Nysza's OH Gerdzhot with their serves and shook up the opponents with short serves, causing Nysza trouble on the reception.
Nisa's serve also went underpowered...
Warsaw's OH Szarbuk, who was in poor form in the first set, started scoring like crazy from the second set onwards, OP Krawek was as decisive as ever, and they just couldn't pick up MB Nowakowski's occasional quick shots at an extreme angle...
(The only thing I was happy about was OH Gerdzhot scoring a service ace for the first time in a while,) but before we knew it, we lost the second set and Warsaw had a big lead in the third set as well.
Nisa has reverted to her usual self lately.
Miyaura was then brought on as the third substitution.
Miyaura himself was in good form, in fact he was quite good, but OH El Graoui, who came in at the same time, was in terrible shape...
Am I the only one who feels that substitutions don't often work well for Nisa?
Things didn't go well in the fourth set either, so OP Ventara was replaced by Miyaura again.
But it's very tough to come back when you're already down by five points, so Coach Prinski, please bring him on a little earlier.
This feeling was even more apparent because Miyaura's performance afterwards was so good.
He made good spikes, didn't make any strange mistakes or get blocked, and finally scored an ace with a powerful serve.
His condition and performance seemed really good, and from Miyaura's own words, I could tell he was playing with a lot of confidence.
Ventala, who is in the starting lineup, is certainly a player with great potential, but Miyaura is just as good, and in terms of the stability of his play, Miyaura seems to have the advantage.
However, there seems to still be something missing to make him a starter.
Or perhaps as a manager he wants to place his hopes on Ventara.
But there's still a chance.
Now that the team is not doing well, I think if he can perform well here and turn the team around, he will have a good chance of taking the starting position from Ventala.
To be honest, you can't survive in the Polish league unless you are that good.
But it seems like he's been waiting patiently for the right opportunity, so let's believe in him and keep a close eye on him!!
Good luck Miyaken!!!
Also, there was a fan from Japan that day.
It was my first time in Poland and I'm not afraid of being misunderstood, but I think it's quite a feat to be able to come to a fairly remote place called Nysa (I can't speak for others (lol)).
That's why I could feel the strength of his feelings for Miyaura.
I would be happy to meet Japanese fans in Poland in the future.
It seems that many people have already been to Italy, so I would be even more excited to see them come to Poland as well.
However, unlike Ishikawa and Takahashi, who are basically guaranteed to start, it seems that Miyaura is held back in that even if you go to watch the game, he may not play, and if he does, it's only for a short time.
For that reason, I have to try and get a spot in the starting lineup!!
Go for it, Kento! (lol)
Miyaura's post-match comments can be found here:
Photo by Katarzyna Barczak Fotografia and author
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