Watching the Olympic volleyball competition has had an effect on local Roxby Downs volleyball players.
Even without the training, knowledge of the game and extensive experience seen within the teams in China, our players have lifted their enthusiasm and initiative to pull some fantastic moves out of the bag!
This week, rallies were hard fought and full of excitement, teams played together instead of as individuals, and even the umpires had a great time watching the action on the court throughout Monday evening!
Early games this week were played between Sina's Saints and Benders, and Overload and Los As Say Toon Us.
Much to the surprise of a confident Benders team, the Ighaniyan brothers led their team to miss out by only small margins on some extremely close sets.
It seems the new faces in Sina's Saints are adding some value and strength to the team and providing a formidable opposition to other teams in the competition.
It will be interesting to see how the team manages when it loses the Branch family in a few weeks!
Match MVP was given to Simon Parker of Benders after he played a consistently strong game and helped his team to victory.
Final scores sat at four sets to nil, 100 vs 71 points.
In the second of the earlier games, an enthusiastic and willing-to-learn Overload faced Los As Say Toon Us.
It overcame the competition's newest team with some powerful spiking by Piero, George, Andres and Rafael, with their spikes supported by the clean setting of Soledad and Krystal.
Overload showed some real promise throughout the match with team captain Ashley Hicks leading by example with his flexible and regularly unorthodox moves at the net.
In the end, LASTU won the match four sets to nil, 100 vs 63 points.
However if the flashes of brilliance are anything to go by, Overload is going to be the team to watch in the coming seasons after they gain some more experience in the more intricate elements of volleyball.
A hard-fought battle between Bum Taps and the Tigers was had in the first of the late games, with only three sets being completed.
In the end Bum Taps took all three sets however the small gap in points (76 vs 57) shows that each point was wrestled from the Tigers.
These two teams are likely to see some shifts in player dynamics after the loss of long-standing captain and strong player Jason Turley from the Bumtaps (formally Phoenix), and Glenn Bassett standing down from the Tigers after running the team for a number of seasons.
The final game of the evening was the most closely fought of the week; Block Its vs Los Tintos.
Block Its was fully manned up with enough players to sub on and off, however Los Tintos needed to call upon two fill-ins after captain Kate Hobbs was sidelined due to injury and another few regular players were unable to attend the game.
Block Its took the opportunity to apply some pressure to its opponent, coming away with 72 points versus the 75 won by Los Tintos.
Unfortunately for Block Its, they were only able to secure one of the three sets played, meaning Los Tintos won the game.
However the combination of Les Ryan, Carl Tinsley and Adelle Wallace worked so well for Block Its on Monday, it appears they are likely to help the team finish strongly for the overall season.
In other volleyball news, the Roxby Downs Volleyball Association has entered a team in the Roxby Relay For Life event to be held during October.
The "Safe Sets" will be raising funds via a variety of means including a raffle and sausage sizzle at next month's market day.
Keep your eye out for Safe Sets merchandise, raffle tickets and the smaller fundraising events being run by the RDVA team and get your support behind them.
If any members of the Roxby Downs Volleyball Association are keen to assist with fundraising for the Safe Sets, please contact Kate on 0407 185 076 or kate.hobbs@bhpbilliton.com.
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