On Wednesday, March 26th local time, two matches were played in the fourth quarter-finals of the Italian Superlegga playoffs. The matches were between Milan, where Tatsunori Otsuka plays, and Civitanova, and between Cisterna, where Yume Tarumi plays, and Trentino.
In the Italian league playoffs, the first team to win three games advances to the next round, and since neither team with Japanese players had two wins, a win in this fourth game was absolutely necessary for either team to keep their hopes of advancing to the semi-finals alive.
Let's start by looking back at Milan vs. Civitanova.
This match was held at Milan's home ground. OH Otsuka started as a starter, following the third match.
In the first set, Civitanova suppressed Milano's attack effectiveness with serve and block, and OP Lagungia and OH Bottolo scored with a high attack success rate, taking the lead from the beginning and taking the lead 17-25 without any trouble. In the second set, Civitanova also took the lead early on, but they turned the game around with two service aces from S. Pollo. Milano continued to score with OH Kaziski and OP Regels, and Milan took the set back with a score difference of 25-17.
However, in the third set, Civitanova blocked Milan's OP Regels with blocks and defense, while they scored points with a variety of attacks with high success rates, winning 20-25. In the fourth set, OH Otsuka was inspired, and Milan took a step forward in the early stages with his attacks and S. Pollo's aces, but Civitanova turned the game around in the middle stages with OH Nikolov's spikes. Milan caught up once in the final stages, but Civitanova took the lead again with MB Sinenies' block, and in the end, Milan's OH Ruati's spike hit the net, and Civitanova won this set 22-25 and won 1-3.
Civitanova, with a quarterfinal record of 3 wins and 1 loss, advanced to the semifinals for the first time in two seasons. On the other hand, Milan lost in the quarterfinals for the first time in three seasons.
Otsuka supported the team to the end with a great performance, scoring the most points in the match with 16 (15 attacks, 1 serve), an attack efficiency rate of 401 TP3T, and a serve reception success rate of 63% (no losses). Especially in the 3rd and 4th sets, he was entrusted with many balls by S. Pollo in place of OP Regels, whose conversion rate had decreased, and he converted half of them into points. He was very reliable.
Due to his performance, he was voted MVP by fans at the venue, but he was unable to lead his team to victory like he did in the first game.
Civitanova's 13 blocks and defense worked well, especially in suppressing the success rate of OP Regels. In addition, S Bonifante, who was named MVP, deployed a variety of attacks, and was able to maintain a high team attack effectiveness rate except for the second set, which was a major factor in the victory.
Milan hoped to break through with some good serves from S. Pollo, who hit five aces, but ultimately fell just short.
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