2018 FIVB World Championship - Japan

  • I could have made it to the end of the game but I had to mute that announcer. So I fell back asleep. I blame it all on him.:cursing:

  • I woke up at 3:15 am to watch SER vs JAP and while getting ready I looked on the TV and I saw Boskovic ready to play and then all of the sudden she leaves the court and Bjelica comes on....I have never seen something like that so I was not sure if I was still dreaming or what... I just watched the replay and I was not dreaming... Boskovic was ready to start the game and she was on the court...so I hope whatever pain she felt is not anything serious.

  • My God. Brazil, China, USA... all of them would do THE SAME THING as Serbia. SAME THING ! Why would you play with your best players and risk some injuries because of non important game for you ??

    They are not guildy because your team failled to qualify...Fight for your own spot and stop blaming others for your fail and don't wait others to help you.

  • My God. Brazil, China, USA... all of them would do THE SAME THING as Serbia. SAME THING ! Why would you play with your best players and risk some injuries because of non important game for you ??

    They are not guildy because your team failled to qualify...Fight for your own spot and stop blaming others for your fail and don't wait others to help you.

    Well look, it's not exactly like that.. USA was already qualified for the QF in London too, and yet they played with their best line-up against Turkey because finishing 1st in the pool was important for them. So Serbia could've played with the best line up and guarantee their 1st place.. so any team can do it either way, it's a question of priorities

  • I'm really surprised by the performance of this Russia team, with or without Goncharova. Startseva is showing everyone why she should be titular, really involving the middles and faster sets to the pins. Hopefully next year, with the recovery of both Krotkova and Goncharova, and the possible return of Malova (the other Russian libero, Galkina in my opinion, is pretty decent) I hope Russia can return to form and show their game and this tournament showed Russia isn't in such a bad shape like everyone make it out to be. It's also okay I guess Russia won't reach the Final 6 and they lose the match to China tomorrow, as they seriously have less firepower and won't be able to compete with the remaining top teams without their main scorer.

  • I woke up at 3:15 am to watch SER vs JAP and while getting ready I looked on the TV and I saw Boskovic ready to play and then all of the sudden she leaves the court and Bjelica comes on....I have never seen something like that so I was not sure if I was still dreaming or what... I just watched the replay and I was not dreaming... Boskovic was ready to start the game and she was on the court...so I hope whatever pain she felt is not anything serious.

    That was weird. I just watched the game--actually, a very fun game--and Boskovic was in the starting lineup, high-fived her way onto the court and then was substituted out before the first serve. Crafty.

  • My God. Brazil, China, USA... all of them would do THE SAME THING as Serbia. SAME THING ! Why would you play with your best players and risk some injuries because of non important game for you ??

    They are not guildy because your team failled to qualify...Fight for your own spot and stop blaming others for your fail and don't wait others to help you.

    That's not accurate. Brazil was still playing with their main players in 2014 WCH against DOM and China was also playing with their main players against Netherlands in WGP 2017 when both teams can rest their superstars for the finals. But I do agree Serbia has all the "right" to play with which players they want.

  • the problem is not that SRB rested some players -- and remember, they are down one OH, so there's only one OH backup to the 2 on court -- the problem i think is that at times, the serbs didn't look like they were trying hard. i only saw parts of the match, but as i said, they were smiling, relaxed, laughing. they didn't want to try hard at all.


    all of that sometimes comes back to bite you in the ass though...


    it's too bad RUS wasn't in pool E, it'd have made things much more interesting...


    i hope BRA can beat JPN 3-0, but also hope SRB will play hard tomorrow against NED.


    i don't hate JPN btw, i love how they play hard and can beat much taller teams with their hard work, but i resent that JPN hosts everything and gets the advantage of playing at home all the time.

  • I'm really surprised by the performance of this Russia team, with or without Goncharova. Startseva is showing everyone why she should be titular, really involving the middles and faster sets to the pins. Hopefully next year, with the recovery of both Krotkova and Goncharova, and the possible return of Malova (the other Russian libero, Galkina in my opinion, is pretty decent) I hope Russia can return to form and show their game and this tournament showed Russia isn't in such a bad shape like everyone make it out to be. It's also okay I guess Russia won't reach the Final 6 and they lose the match to China tomorrow, as they seriously have less firepower and won't be able to compete with the remaining top teams without their main scorer.

    And Kosheleva now working with Bernardinho will finally learn how to pass :D

  • are you talking about the player of the century??????


    well, he does have a WCh ring though...

    It really was a poisoned apple, wasn't it? The beginning of everything wrong with this team, when he seriously started to believe his own bs. Now the US are cursed for another Olympic cycle with this quack and his breathing therapy.

  • I think we should differentiate two things about the Serbian team. Firstly, I think Serbia has all the right to rest their main players and there is nothing wrong with this. If the Serbian team lost the game against Japan because of their bench players, I'm more than fine with this. But if they lost the game because it's part of their strategy to eliminate Brazil, that's another story.

  • There’s a difference though between not playing at absolute maximum level because you lack motivation or want to conserve energy and actively trying to lose. Like I said earlier, if Serbia had been so desperate to eliminate Brazil then they could have done so by losing 0-3 to Japan and then giving a set to NED tomorrow, but they didn’t do that.

  • There’s a difference though between not playing at absolute maximum level because you lack motivation or want to conserve energy and actively trying to lose. Like I said earlier, if Serbia had been so desperate to eliminate Brazil then they could have done so by losing 0-3 to Japan and then giving a set to NED tomorrow, but they didn’t do that.

    well, Serbia still wants to be the 1st place of the group though, which means they still need a set or two by my calculation to be sure.