The Akademiya-Kazan volleyball team played against one of the contenders for the gold medals of the Russian Premier League A championship last weekend. The student team hosted volleyball players from Tyumen at the Burevestnik Sports Complex.
Already in the first game the hosts of the tour who were trailing by 20 points and two lines in the standings decided not to put everything off for long draws. Maksim Maksimov's wards confidently led the game and outplayed the visitors by five goals (25:20). In the second game the academicians sealed their advantage increasing the difference to 11 points (25:14). Emboldened by their success the students seemed to relax in the third game, and the volleyball players from the Tyumen region took advantage of it. Having adjusted their tactics under the circumstances, the visitors won the third set with a score of 19:25. To their credit the Kazan players pulled themselves together and sealed the deal, winning the game and the match 25-22 and 3-1, respectively.
The repeat match was like a "battle of the two giants", in each of the four games it was impossible to say for sure who would win in the end. Spoiler alert: the visitors played more reliably. In the first set Tyumen managed to take the lead with confidence (21:25). In the second set the academicians could lead the game to the tie-break and won it 26:24. The third and the fourth games turned out to be unstable for the Kazan team, but the guests managed to win the game (20:25, 22:25).
According to Maxim Maksimov, head coach of Academia-Kazan, the main task for this round was solved in the first day thanks to the victory. "That's why on the second day I gave an opportunity to play to our youth and those who had little game practice. I wanted to see them in action," said the head of the team. - We tried on that day to take points with the forces we had. It didn't work out a bit. The emotional background was very weak; there was no fervour and fighting spirit. As for the first day, we played the first two games cleanly, we were good at everything. In the third and fourth game we started to serve more mistakes, while the opponent accepted almost everything. It was hard for us to work on the block. The boys played confidently towards the end of the fourth set, scoring the important goals. I think we won deservedly, just as we lost deservedly on the second day. Although there were chances to fight back.
