We have been waiting! The Russian men’s volleyball championship has started. And the first round already brought several interesting matches. Zenit-Kazan and Belogorye played five matches in the National Volleyball Classic. Kuzbass, which became a pirate after reaching the Final Four of the Legends Cup, lost at home to Yenisei, and Dynamo, although it scored three points, did not convince in Novi Urengoy.
“Mind Games” by Verbov and Volkov
The main match of the tour was, of course, the match in Tula, where Belogorye hosted Zenit Kazan. This match is also called “The Classic” of national volleyball. Well, the game was a success!
The match turned into a real chess match. Alexander Volkov was without injured attack leader Mohamed Al Khachdadi and left Zhang Jining, who had not yet fully recovered his form after his vacation, on the reserve side. The Kazan team took to the field without Maxim Mikhailov and Ilya Fedorov; Sam Deru, who joined the team only a couple of days ago, but had already managed to help out in the Super Cup match, also remained on the reserve side.
Zhang Jin Yin
Photo: belogorievolley.ru
As a result, both coaches had to throw reserves into the battle. First, Volkov sent Zhang onto the court: Belogorye lost the set, which started with a 7-2, and Andrei Marchenko did not enter the game – only 1 of 7 in attack. The Chinese entered the match convincingly – four aces in the second set alone. The hosts still had the third set – I immediately remembered that last season the Kazan Club won only one of four matches against Belogorye. Alexey Verbov also had to introduce the main players into the battle. With them, the Kazan team confidently won both the fourth and fifth match. This seems to be a case where both coaches can be happy. Verbov – because they managed to win, Volkov – because the team played on equal terms with the champion, even without their attacking leader. Mentally, the Belgorodians probably even won. The confrontation will continue in a month – Zenit-Kazan and Belogorye will compete in the semifinals of the Legends Cup.
The pirates were boarded
In Kemerovo, Kuzbass and Yenisei faced each other, teams that performed well at the Legends Cup. The home team, who called themselves pirates, were considered the favourites by the bookmakers, but the Krasnoyarsk team managed to impose its game on the opponent. If the first two sets were played evenly – the teams exchanged victories 25:23, then Yenisei looked much more confident in the future. All Kuzbass managed to do was make a small breakthrough in the third game, when they managed to get within three points with a score of 8:16. But everything remained a problem – the Krasnoyarsk team controlled the match, led by Roman Murashko and Maxim Bocharov, who scored 20 points each with good efficiency.
“Kuzbass” – “Enisey” – 1:3
Photo: vc-enisey.ru
“Today our opponents served and attacked better, that is the main thing. In the first two games we still had some play, but in the following ones we unfortunately did not play the game, the opponent played the game, they were better. There were many elements missing, almost all of them,” admitted Kemerovo coach Sergei Trotsky after the match.
Dinamo won, but did not convince
Dynamo Moscow, after the failure in the Super Cup match, visited Novy Urengoy. And the first set for the Muscovites turned out to be a real cold shower: “Fakel” was better in everything. Tsvetan Sokolov did not immediately enter the match: only 2 out of 10 goals were scored in the first set, and in general the blue-and-whites looked pale. Later they managed to take control of the match, and “Fakel” also helped a lot: Urengoy’s players could not maintain the level of the first set and made mistakes. Roman Empolov tried to influence the course of the match with numerous substitutions, but things did not improve. Maybe it was not worth changing anything?
Fakel-Yamal – Dynamo – 1:3
Photo: fakevolley.ru
“We seem to be plagued by those final moments when we need to score in one go, but we don’t score, or we can’t make mistakes, but we do make mistakes. But it’s also about the youth of the players,” Yamal’s coach complained.
What else happened on the tour?
Moscow MSTU held its first match in the elite in 20 years! The Surgut “students” fought with “Gazprom-Yugra” in each of the games, but could not take a single set – the team is still raw.
Zenit St. Petersburg defeated Neftyanik in Orenburg. Vladimir Alekno was satisfied with his team, but we will not evaluate their prospects based on this meeting: the Orenburg team is already a class below and is also clearly exhausted.
Dinamo-Ural not only changed its name in the off-season, but also made significant renovations to the playing hall. Boris Kolchin’s team had a successful start at its new home, winning the match against Novaya 3:0. The Ufa team looked a little better in all elements, which led to a fairly confident victory.
“Dynamo-LO” – ASC – 3:2
Photo: vc-dynamo.ru
Dynamo-LO and ASK played all five sets. The winner was the Sosnovoborst team, which had more status by name, but still lacked teamwork and composure. The team from Nizhny Novgorod proved that this season they will definitely not be scapegoats. Among them was the best scorer of the first round – Pavel Zheleznyakov scored 27 points.
All the results of the 1st round matches:
Gazprom-Yugra (Surgut) – MSTU (Moscow) – 3:0 (27:25, 25:23, 25:22); “Dinamo-Ural” (Ufa) – “Nova” (Novokuibyshevsk) – 3:0 (25:23, 25:19, 25:23); “Neftyanik” (Orenburg) – “Zenit” (St. Petersburg) – 0:3 (13:25, 18:25, 12:25); “Dynamo-LO” (Sosnovy Bor) – ASK (Nizhny Novgorod) – 3:2 (25:20, 22:25, 25:21, 21:25, 15:12); “Kuzbass” – “Yenisey” – 1:3 (23:25, 25:23, 21:25, 15:25); “Fakel-Yamal” – “Dynamo” – 1:3 (25:18, 18:25, 21:25, 18:25); “Belogorye” – “Zenit-Kazan” – 2:3 (19:25, 25:22, 25:22, 19:25, 8:15).
