Italy- Superlega 2018/2019

    Yavor, they'll stay in Bari. It's like a football pre-season retirement. Players will be on their own, far from families and the routine to focus on the trainings. Football teams use this practice very often when things go bad and nothing works to re-build the team spirit and try to find chemistry. It is a kind of punishment.


    IMHO Emma Villas has a very weak diagonal. Marouf doesn't work in Italy. Not just technically talking, I don't know, but I don't like him whenever I see Emma Villas. And Hernandez, despite being one of my favourite cubans, never worked well for a top team (Halkbank and Piacenza).

    Quote from QueenPiccininiLover

    IMHO Emma Villas has a very weak diagonal. Marouf doesn't work in Italy. Not just technically talking, I don't know, but I don't like him whenever I see Emma Villas.

    Marouf technically is good enough to play in any top 8 teams in any league. He's just not the type of the setter that fits Siena. Check this video, TBH, I can not name 10 setters who can set up better than Marouf in such a tough situation.


    https://gss3.baidu.com/6LZ0ej3…f0322a1aee8998b1072_0.mp4

    Quote from kyle7in1

    The final ranking of the top 4 teams after regular season is almost there - Perugia, Trento, Lube and Modena.

    Milano has the same points as Modena, But in the last three rounds,

    Miano will face Lube, Valentia, and and Perugia,

    while Modena will play with Siena, Trento and Verona.

    So the chances of Milano ranking higher than Modena are slim.

    I wouldn't say they're slim. Modena just lost to Monza today and it's no secret they're basically hanging by a thread at this point, so I wouldn't be surprised if they lost to both Trento and Verona. Milano might grab a point or two against Perugia and/or Lube, so it's still up for grabs I think.

    Yes, it is exactly as QPL explained.. sorry YavorD if I took that expression for granted.


    Anyway, I would say it comes a bit too late as a decision.. Siena has been a mess this season, only judgind by how they fire Cichello, themn hired Zanini but after two months they called Cichello back.

    And I agree, Marouf doesn't really fits this team.. I hope they can be there next year in A1, even if relegation looks now inevitable. They look like abgood and healthy club, they need better experience in high categories..

    If Siena is rich enough to buy players of this calibre, they can probably buy their way in the league next season.


    I feel Siena is just putting too much pressure on themselves. Not all teams that came from the B league can just be a top 8 team especially this year when a whole bunch of teams upgraded their roster.


    I actually like this team. The ambition that they had is off the charts but I guess something didn't work out along the way. If they can stay in the superlega and make a do-over, it would be really nice.

    Favorite players: M: Maxim Mikhaylov, Murilo, Serginho, Aaron Russell, Otavio, Simone Giannelli, Ivan Zaytsev, Tsvetan Sokolov, Michał Kubiak, Mariusz Wlazly, Pawel Zagummy W: Sheilla, Zhu Ting, Natalia, Fe Garay, Fofao, Gabi, Thaisa, Foluke Akinradewo, Wei Qiuyue, Ding Xia, Carli Lloyd, Fabi, Natalia Goncharova, Yuko Sano, Saoris Kimura and Sakoda


    #FreeBritney

    From the statistics, Siena is a lot better than some of the other teams in the league.


    Their block is really bad but there are worse-block performers like Latina and Sora.


    The one thing we are missing ofcourse is the digging statistics which legavolley doesn't show for some reason.


    Despite the missing stat, I think we can say that while Sora and Latina are worse blockers than Siena but they are probably more defensively-inclined which could explain their higher standing.

    Favorite players: M: Maxim Mikhaylov, Murilo, Serginho, Aaron Russell, Otavio, Simone Giannelli, Ivan Zaytsev, Tsvetan Sokolov, Michał Kubiak, Mariusz Wlazly, Pawel Zagummy W: Sheilla, Zhu Ting, Natalia, Fe Garay, Fofao, Gabi, Thaisa, Foluke Akinradewo, Wei Qiuyue, Ding Xia, Carli Lloyd, Fabi, Natalia Goncharova, Yuko Sano, Saoris Kimura and Sakoda


    #FreeBritney

    Quote from andrea

    Was it because of players with model-like appearances like Piccinini and Cacciatori? So does popularity of men's volleyball surpass women's nowadays in Italy? I'm asking because I've found that the thread about women's Italian league is much longer than men's one.

    Only on this forum women’s thread is more popular than all of the men’s. Actually all of the women’s threads are more popular here.

    Quote from andrea

    Was it because of players with model-like appearances like Piccinini and Cacciatori? So does popularity of men's volleyball surpass women's nowadays in Italy? I'm asking because I've found that the thread about women's Italian league is much longer than men's one.

    Unfortunately, true with almost any female topic here indeed. I think there are more fans of female volleyball here, that's the reason. I wish it had been at least 50-50, but such has been the status quo since the very beginning.

    Quote from Diesse14

    Yes, it is exactly as QPL explained.. sorry YavorD if I took that expression for granted.

    Thanks to you both for the explanation! It was the word retirement that made it unclear, that's all. I also know this practice from football mostly. I am not sure what the best way to describe the situation is, perhaps somewhere between camp and isolation.

    Quote from YavorD

    Unfortunately, true with almost any female topic here indeed. I think there are more fans of female volleyball here, that's the reason. I wish it had been at least 50-50, but such has been the status quo since the very beginning.

    Thanks to you both for the explanation! It was the word retirement that made it unclear, that's all. I also know this practice from football mostly. I am not sure what the best way to describe the situation is, perhaps somewhere between camp and isolation.

    I thought it's called Closed training Camp!

    Quote from andrea

    Was it because of players with model-like appearances like Piccinini and Cacciatori? So does popularity of men's volleyball surpass women's nowadays in Italy? I'm asking because I've found that the thread about women's Italian league is much longer than men's one.

    Yes. Piccinini and Cacciatori were the first women's volleyball players to appear in commercials.

    And when Italy won the 2002 WCH, women's volleyball started growning drastically till 2008/2009, when the italian economy was almost dead and Turkey started stealing all the world class players.


    Anyway, women's volleyball is nowhere close to men's volleyball in Italy. Superlega is an elite league, the best in the world, and it works perfectly. Serie A1 is a mess. The audience in men's volleyball is way higher. Halls are always sold out (there are just few exceptions). Marketing is way bigger. The show is just amazing. Even now, that some players go in and out to sign one year deals in Asia, arabian countries, Russia and Poland, the league is still amazing. Despite everything, the men's NT keeps winning olympic medals every 4 years; they just missed the podium in Beijing. Women's NT never made it to the semifinals on the other hand.

    Quote from YavorD

    Unfortunately, true with almost any female topic here indeed. I think there are more fans of female volleyball here, that's the reason. I wish it had been at least 50-50, but such has been the status quo since the very beginning.

    The funny fact is the I watch 80% men's volleyball and 20% women's volleyball lately ('cause I find most of the games bad and boring), but, since the men's volleyball topics are always empty, I find myself talking about women's volleyball 80% of the time, which is the opposite.:aww:

    Quote from QueenPiccininiLover

    The funny fact is the I watch 80% men's volleyball and 20% women's volleyball lately ('cause I find most of the games bad and boring), but, since the men's volleyball topics are always empty, I find myself talking about women's volleyball 80% of the time, which is the opposite.:aww:

    :lol: I have the same :lol: Actually good to know. Maybe it will let be alive for some men's topics.

    I watched both men (70%) and women (30%) volleyball games. In this forum it seems most members like to discuss women's volleyball more than men's, esp women's Turkey and Italy league. Funny though..

    Thanks for all the responses and solving this "mystery" to me :). I'd hope that there is a forum where men's volleyball would be discussed more, and inside.volley is already the best I've found. In the past I've heard from different sources that men's volleyball is way more popular than women's in Europe. However, I've observed the very opposite here. It's likely that English is not the first language in most European countries, so this forum is not representative of the fan population from Europe in general. A lot of members here are from (southeast) Asia, in which women's volleyball is more popular. Perhaps that explains why.

    Watched the replay of Modena vs Monza. It's another lousy performance from Modena which is very disorganized at the moment. They simply couldn't build the momentum to win when facing better-quality teams. I doubt even Christenson's return wouldn't make a big difference. This team has good-quality players in all positions, but stability is missing from many of them, and no one (perhaps the team management expected that person to be Zaytsev before the season started) steps up to carry the team at crunch time. Star players of this team still have brief moments to shine once in a while, but their overall value exhibited throughout the season is not better than some ordinary but stable players, like the OHs from Monza.

    Quote from andrea

    Thanks for all the responses and solving this "mystery" to me :). I'd hope that there is a forum where men's volleyball would be discussed more, and inside.volley is already the best I've found. In the past I've heard from different sources that men's volleyball is way more popular than women's in Europe. However, I've observed the very opposite here. It's likely that English is not the first language in most European countries, so this forum is not representative of the fan population from Europe in general. A lot of members here are from (southeast) Asia, in which women's volleyball is more popular. Perhaps that explains why.

    There is a lot more men's discussion than women's on reddit /r/volleyball. Although it is more of a general volleyball forum and not specific to the pro game.