European Olympic Qualification

  • Lena is awesome!! She's one of my favorite players!!


    It's too bad Poland didn't manage to win with such strong support of all the Polish fans in the arena. I did my best, but at the end I couldn't utter a single word,I was so screamed out! It was a great experience to be there in Halle, but I had tears in my eyes when we lost... Oh well, they should still quialfy from the Japan tournament, but it would have been so great if they had won yesterday... Oh well, they're still awesome!!

  • ^ eheh exactly
    It would have been really great if they had qualified yesterday cos now we have to be kinda nervous till may since the ticket is still not in our bag... how i hate such uncertainty :D


    Im proud of the girls anyway, 3:2 is a great result and they showed such a nice match to all the spectators.
    As Ania Baranska said it might have been better to loose 0:3 cos a 2:3 hurts much more but now nobody can really say that the poles are a much worse team than russia :)


    im still under the excitement of yesterday :lol:

  • Yeah, it had to hurt to lose 2:3, after such a fight to win the 2 previous sets! It was a moment of weakness, but sadly it was in such an important moment of the match and they didn't manage to catch up to the Russians... I strongly believe that they will qualify from the intercontinental tournament, but still it's gonna be a lot of stress and all. They could already be training for the Olympic now, instead of preparing for the May tournament and then again for the Olympic games. Oh well, they are fantastic players so they will manage :D They have to!!!! :)

  • Wow Thank you Nastja :rose:
    I'm addicted to this www

  • I really hope that it'll be the Netherlands 8) But if there's one thing we've learned about the netherlands this tournament it's that they can't deal with pressure. They've won the GP (being the underdog) but then played awful at the EC (everyone expected them to play great) and now this tournament.. ?(


    I don't think it's worth to say than NED can't play under pressure. Cos it was a PRESSURE. Just imagine, you hardly trained for 4 years for only one aim, all the volleyball resources of the whole country work for you. And everybody every day tells you, that you have to get to the OG. You know how many people are looking at you and waiting the only one acceptable result. Also, you know, that you have the only one shot and no right to make a mistake. Anybody will brake under such circumstances if he is not a robot. And they have been broken, even coach :( . Dutch are theirselves guilty in that. They didn't care about making this pressure on the team lower. They had to implement a psycological trainings for players or just don't demand impossible results.


    Lets see how team played. 1st game with Poland -pressure is high - players forgot how to play volleyball, coach forgot how to make substitutions. 2nd game with Turkey - they still have chances to qualify - No play! Manon doesn't attack, Kim doesn't set, Huurman no block. Then was first set of the 3rd game with Germany. Still there is a minimal chance, they had to win 3:0 to get to the semi-final. No play, losing first set - losing everything! AND HEY-OPA! No pressure! Just nothing to loose. Smiles on their faces. And what we see? They smash Germany! Win three sets in a row!


    In my opinion, there was a mistake of the coach. He have to feel the nervousness of his players and make substitutions in time. He HAD to change Manon Flier for Alice Blom, Kim Staelens for Riette Fledderus and Francien Huurman for Caroline Wensink. These three players were SO shaking that just couldn't play even 10% of their power. But he started thinking only at the end of the second game with Turkey... :(


    Anyway, Nederland is 10th in the word ranking right after Poland. If some weak team will refuse from taking part in OG, NED is the first candidate to replace it or to take part in the last qualification tournament.

  • Thanks so much for sharing the pics Nastja!! I have a couple from the final, so I'll try to upload them later and share. But like you mentioned, we were too busy cheering for our team to take pics, hehe :D


  • For people who say we can't play if one of our three main players are out, we proved them wrong.


    there is one more team who proved the same thing:TURKEY.
    to tell the truth ı had thought it will be a terrible qualf. for our team before the tournm. but ı was just shocked by the great game against Nedherlands and they played good against Germany and Poland.Duygu,Bahar,Naz,Neriman,Nihan they were always substitues in the team but they all played good especially Naz.she used all the players efficiently especially Aysun.Naz was like a rebirth for her.they will gain more experience in the WGP08 and maybe will surprise more teams ı hope.congrats to Turkey,Poland(ı just love their game they played great in the final Good luck in May in Japan) and Russia. it was a totally different team from th ECH07.

  • I think Turkey really did good considering they lacked some of their key players.


  • Consideration of the results in Halle


    Seldom there was such an unity at a balance-pressconference:


    Ralf Weber (Authorised officer Gerry Weber Management & Event OHG), Jan Hronek (Vice-President of CEV), Werner von Moltke (President of the german federation DVV) and Nationalteam- Coach Giovanni Guidette said unanimously:


    A great event, the organisation was excellent, worth for presenting an Olympia- Qualification. In the following lines the statements of the four mentioned persons will be quoted, which they gave before the final between Russia and Poland.



    Ralf Weber: A very successful week comes to an end. I thank CEV and DVV for an uncomplicated cooperation. For the first time there was the atmosphere of Olympia noticable in the Stadium of Gerry Weber, which was able to reach around 40mio. people thanks to the great TV- broadcasting. About 26.500 spectators were guests this week and also with this statistic we are very satisfied, especially with the euphoric mood of the audience. Volleyball has a great rating for us that's why we want to apply for more important events in the future, no matter if its Women's, Men's or even Beach-Volleyball. Im already looking forward for the German Volleyball Cup in some weeks.


    Jan Hronek: I have to thank the organisation team from all my heart, im saying this also in order by the 8 teams. My special thanks goes to the volunteers, who were working with great enthusiasm. It was an excellent organisation and we are always ready to come back.



    Werner von Moltke: It was a perfect organisation, thats what we were guessing because of the last two DVV-Cup Finals. We would be happy to be more often a guest in Halle. We applied because the Olympia participation is the biggest aim of every sportsmen. We knew that its gonna be hard for our team, because they are weaker on the papers. But the team often showed what it is capable of, but summing up the tournament showed us what position we have. We have to learn from it. But this event showed what an attractive sport Volleyball is.



    Giovanni Guidetti: I have to thank DVV and Gerry Weber World for a perfect organisation and the possibility to play here. My team was not 100% able to show what was needed to. The loss of Kerstin Tzscherlich hurted us a lot eventhough Heike Beier played a good tournament. The injury of Hanka Pachale a day before the tournament started, inhibited her, too. The other teams were better and we have to work hard in the future to be able to join them. Angelina Grun will probably make a little break from the nationalteam this year after playing many many years. But Tzscherlich will play. I havent talked to Hanka Pachale yet, but i guess she wont play this summer either because she is getting married. It would be nice to come back to Halle soon again. Maybe we will get the opportunity to play 3 friendly matches against Brazil before the Olympic Games.

  • That was an interesting read, thanks for posting!

  • Giovanni Guidetti: I have to thank DVV and Gerry Weber World for a perfect organisation and the possibility to play here. My team was not 100% able to show what was needed to. The loss of Kerstin Tzscherlich hurted us a lot eventhough Heike Beier played a good tournament. The injury of Hanka Pachale a day before the tournament started, inhibited her, too. The other teams were better and we have to work hard in the future to be able to join them. Angelina Grun will probably make a little break from the nationalteam this year after playing many many years. But Tzscherlich will play. I havent talked to Hanka Pachale yet, but i guess she wont play this summer either because she is getting married. It would be nice to come back to Halle soon again. Maybe we will get the opportunity to play 3 friendly matches against Brazil before the Olympic Games.




    so we will finally see what they will do without GRÜN :whistle:

  • so we will finally see what they will do without GRÜN :whistle:

    ı am so excited,too. we show what can we do without neslihan.and it is german team's turn :roll: