It's has been a couple of stressful weeks since my last article here on the blog. First we got through a two match weekend with a 3-0 win against Frederiksberg(now 6-5) last Sunday, and the next day we hosted Gentofte(now 3-8) also resulting in a 3-0 win bringing us to a 9-2 record at Christmas break.
Both matches was won with great disciplin from the girls, making very few error and thereby forcing the opponents to make their own points, which was something we knew both opponents had been struggling with in prior matches.
Kristen played libero in both matches while we have been working hard to get Jeanette ready for the cup semifinal match against Skovbakken(now 3-8). Kristen did a very good job stabilising our passing that had been up and down since Jeanette got hurt.
A successful half season..? all comes down to one match!
It is a very special feeling I am experiencing having my first season with a team that are favorits everytime we play.
When the season started we all knew what potential this team had with the number of fantastic players running down the teamsheet. But we also knew it would take some time to build the "team" in the team and make these players perform well together under pressure.
Looking back now we have arrived at Christmas and we have had a season counting a 9-2 record in the league putting us in 2nd only having lost to number 1 Holte(now 11-0). We lost a close 5game match against the Nordic Championship favorits Somero sending us out of that tournament but leaving with a feeling that we can compete with the best team in Scandinavia. Finally we are 3-0 in the cup tournament bringing us to the semifinal.
All in a a very good 1st half of the season and eventhough we would have loved to be undefeated a 13-3 record is by far acceptable at this point. However, it is a funny world coaching a favorit team like Fortuna who is expected to get medals and preferably gold. We played our cup semifinal tonight and that would determin weither or not our first half of the season is a success or a fiasko. When you only count medals it doesn't matter that a team is 11-0 like Holte or 3-8 like Skovbakken. They are both in the semifinals in the cup and have a chance to play for medals and that is exactly our focus in Fortuna right now... We urge to beat Holte at some point in this season and there is not a better time to do it than when you play for the medals.
But first we had a match today against Skovbakken in our way to get to the final. Let me start by saying that we won the match 3-0 in 55 min. and the girls played some of the most errorless and disciplined volleyball I have seen all season. We expected a tough serving Skovbakken team but our passers just kept making great options for Dorthe who had a great day deviding our hitter as she wanted.
Jeanette's leg was tested before the match and we decided to play her and she played a super match making it a sad day for the Skovbakken servers.
Our own servers made a ton of aces leaving Skovbakken unable to find answers to turn arround the match. Katherine and Caley won almost everything they touched and also Kristen did hers to a very strong team-performance.
Juliane played her best match on middle so far this season getting the MVP title and her connection with Dorthe really picked up tonight. And just like last time we played Skovbakken Lotte managed to completely close down any attempts from their starmiddle Ivana Babic who got 1 kill in the match.
So the win brings us to the cup final played on January 24th and it was a big relief for us all.
Personally I felt a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. Now we are playing for medals and this is a new chance for us and trust me WE WILL GO FOR IT.
The girls now have a few easy practises left this week before everyone leaves for Christmas break. 2 practises between Christmas and New years and the we start again on January 4th and have our first match in 2010 on the 9th against ASV(now 1-10).
I wanna send a thank you to all the girls for a hard fight the past 4-5 months. We are working hard every day and we are going somewhere that is the dream of every single person on this team... THE FINALS!
"Fly me to the moon and let me sing among the stars, let me see what spring is like on Jupiter and Mars"
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