Serbian NT 2016

    In 2008, Serbia lost for Brazil,Italy and Russia 3-0 in the preliminary round. And lost to Cuba 3-0 in quaterfinals but it was really close 26-24/25-19/26-24, it could have gone either way....
    That`s why I don't like having only 12 teams and divided only in 2 groups, is boring, because does not matter if you finish in 1st or 4th, all that matters is the quaterfinals, just look Brazil and Russia in 2012...


    They should have 16 teams, divided in groups of 4, then only the first 2 teams in each group reach the quaterfinals...

    I wish blocking was better. But it's OK, these friendlies will do them good because they haven't played any matches in a month.


    I'm just disappointed that they flew to Brazil in economy class, while the men's basketball team got first class tickets. :thumbdown:

    So it was 3x0 and then Brazil changed the entire team, except for Fe Garay, who by the way played amazing looking at the stats!
    Good to see Fabiola playing 2 full sets! And Gabi doing a good job as OPP.

    They are playing again today right?? Well, Malesevic,Nikolic and Busa "better show up"...I was not expecting Serbia getting blocked 16 tmes..


    And I can not believe Ze Roberto would not let Fabiola play the whole match....

    Quote from rbdfabio

    They are playing again today right?? Well, Malesevic,Nikolic and Busa "better show up"...I was not expecting Serbia getting blocked 16 tmes..


    And I can not believe Ze Roberto would not let Fabiola play the whole match....


    they play again this Sunday at 11am (Brazilian Time)

    I'm glad Serbia won....But Nikolic,Malesevvic and Busa needs to help the team more with scoring......Seams like Stevanovic played good.


    For Brazil Sheila with only 5 is not good, plus I can't believe Ze did not let Fabiola play a full match....if something happens to Dani Line what will he do?

    It's a bit strange that Thaisa didn't enter the court at all, hopefully she was just being rested.


    Both Ognjenović and Terzić agree that the team played much better than in the first match, where they performed quite badly. Everyone got a chance to play and did well, things are progressing like they should.
    Lots of aces for Serbia, that's a good sign. As for the 2nd OH, everyone played at some parts of the match, and their spiking percentage is actually not that bad at all. They just didn't get as many balls.


    I'm sure both teams will take valuable lessons from these games and use them as an opportunity to build upon certain things.
    Now Serbia has one more friendly game before the start of the Olympics, against Russia in Rio on Wednesday.

    Thaisa is a big part of brazil attack and blocking. her not playing definitely makes the win not as convincing. but then again
    it's only a friendly game i'm sure they didn't play very hard. the most important thing now is not get injured.
    serbia blocked better this game as expected but they could still do better. they should be neck and neck with russia for the
    best blocking team. actually serbia and russia play exactly the same style of ball, relying on 2 big hitters and a strong blocking.
    mihajlovic scored at 40% two games in a row. that's a bit worrying. serbia needs both her and boskovic to score
    at the high 40s to be successful.

    So, the Olympics are over, girls were welcomed back home as heroes together with the rest of Serbian athletes who won medals, the interest in women's volleyball went through the roof over those two weeks. It was already the most popular women's sport over here, but now these players really are household names.


    Perhaps somewhat surprisingly, no one has said the R-word yet. I was sure Nikolić would retire from NT and half-expected Ognjenović to do the same, but they haven't said anything. According to Brankica, it's still unknown whether those two would be on the team in 2017.

    Oh nice to know volleyball is the most popular sport for women's in Serbia.
    And they did amazing, I'm so proud of them. ( I still can't get over they did not win the Gold)..


    If Maja wants to stay is great, wanst Fofao 36 or so in Beijing. Maja has 2 Silver medals and 2 bronze, she probably wants Gold still, maybe take 2017 off and come back for the World Championship.


    As for Nikolic, even if she wants to stay I think finally Terzic won't let her, surprisingly she was the only player that did not play during the knock out rounds.


    Serbia just needs to keep doing what they are doing and they will be dominating next 4 years with China. :heart:

    Good to hear they are so popular, they really deserve all the credit they get for another great international season, though I do wish they had gone home with gold. I really hope Maja stays on a personal level (just love watching her!) but also for the good of the team. She is the best setter in the world and I'm not sure if her replacement could step up to that level. Is Antonijevic ever likely to play for the nt again? The opposite is true for Nikolic, sadly. I don't like to say it because she has been so good in the past, but her performances for the nt in that Olympic cycle were consistently bad and Terzic should have stopped picking her years ago and only didn't out of loyalty to her, I believe.

    I believe Maja will be there for Wch 2018 at least. Her boyfriend said that they won't start a family yet because ''Maja has a lot more to play''. I think as long as she plays professionally, she will be on NT too. Skipping Ech 2017 would be a good decision though.
    As for Jelena, I would be surprised if she planned to stick around. Probably she just didn't want to make a big deal out of her retirement by making the public announcement. She also probably knows what would be the reactions of serbian volleyball fans to such news.

    He's a former water polo player, a two-times Olympic medalist from Sydney and Athens. Had to end his career in 2008 after a bad motorcycle accident.


    I believe the main reason for Nikolić's presence on the team was that her experience brought some stablity off the court, which was especially important at an event like the Olympics. It was kept a secret all these years, but recently it came out in public that the attitude was a major problem in Beijing - the players were unhappy that they weren't allowed to attend the opening ceremony and it caused tension between them and Terzić, they weren't focused on the game and spent too much time running around the Olympic village chasing famous athletes etc. SInce there were quite a few first-time Olympians on the team, I guess Terzić wanted to avoid such a scenario.