South Korea - Women's V-League 2020-2021

Kim Su-ji, do you have an inferiority complex towards your friend or something? Can you try to get just one block in? Actually, the league seems to have an inferiority complex when it comes to KYK. Bowing down to her, just watching her play instead of taking it to her. Even Bulgaria seemed less scared of her! GS Caltex are the only ones willing to put up a fight. You should be playing to take her fucking head off! Every game! Cause that's what she's playing for. That's KYK mentality.

The whole V-League minus GS Caltex (and Hi-pass before always screwing it up) are just giving up before even trying. KYK is a legend! She's so good! How can we win? How can we even try? Let's not even fight for one set. Win or lose, SHOW SOME PRIDE. Make her life hard on every play. Kim was targeting Lazareva all game. I'll take care of you. I'm gonna hit all those balls at you, I'm gonna block you at critical moments, score all those points against you. Where you at? Hello Lazareva? Respond damn! Pyo Seung-joo, Kim was literally MOCKING you after a play last game. Did you hide under a blanket? Where's that fire in your eyes that says I'm gonna get you back?

aaaand Rousseaux is on OH, Lee Dahyun MB and Jung Jiyun OP lmao just like you recommended

the Hyundai Coach is stalking this forum xDD

I'd say KGC is really "Diouf n her support mates" . Diouf seems ran out of fuel from the last 5 set match, and the others couldn't help her.. and they were going down "easily".. As volleyballdavely11 mention, Hillstate form a good formation... and it pays off... Their blocking schemes looks formidable..

With full time Lee Da Hyun and Yang HJ as MB, blocking rates going up... Jung JH as wing spikers also upped their attack power...

I hope they can solidify this formation...

I'm sorry to say for Kim Da In.. It looks like she won't be main setter anytime soon.. since she lacks play time experience added with average skills, she seems doomed to be backup 3 seasons in a row...

Hi-pass deserved this one. At 0-2, they never gave up when they could have crumbled. And it gave us THAT interview at the end hahahaha. It was just meant to be. IBK lacked that killer instinct to finish the game. Instead, they continued to make errors, throwing away sets for free... TWENTY freaking serve errors alone. LOL. Kelsie got emotional at the end. Hopefully, this will start a winning trend for Hi-pass; they deserve better than their record.

The bear woke up today! After being scratched as a starter (!), Park Jeong-ah really earned her nickname in the clutch! Kelsie being more subdued offensively today, Jeong-ah had to carry the team on her back during sets 3 and 4. And she did it (with a lot of help from IBK)! So that brought us one of the more "interesting" situation at the end when Park was named MVP. You could smell the awkwardness like an old divorced couple randomly meeting at a party . Gargamel and Park Jeong-ah should just go on Eye Contact and bury the hatchet . That would make for a good show!

Speaking of Kelsie, she didn't play a great game but she really bailed her team out as a defender in the back row during crucial moments. It still hasn't clicked yet with the setter and she needs more consistency, but you can see the potential.

Kim Hee-jin gets an F today. Come on... You can't be paid 500 M KRW and score only 4 points in a 5 set game, the same as your opponent's SETTER. If only you were being unproductive, but then you go on to make 4 serve errors + a net touch penalty at the worst possible moment when your team was leading... So far, she just doesn't connect with Cho Song-hwa, rendering her attacks quasi-useless. She's not that prolific at blocking either... In two rounds, Kim Hee-jin has played only one good game. If she's still battling injuries, Coach should sit her down a bit and play Choi Ga-eun instead. Otherwise, no excuse girl! Especially as the Captain of your team, you should go and earn your money!

Kim Su-ji was not that much better, although some of her trademark attacks worked today. But she also committed 4 serve errors + one bonehead net touch at the worst time possible, killing the rhythm of her team. Those two veterans are most of your salary cap, in the same position. That's a lot of cap space spent on players that have not been difference-makers this year (yet).

Lazareva got blocked 10 times today! A lot of it is due to Song-hwa's piss poor tosses, but as the number one option, you need to close the game during clutch moments. Her youth and inexperience are showing. Good play or bad play, you got to keep your calm and encourage your teammates. When they see you pouting, it doesn't help the atmosphere at all.

I don't if Slow Song-hwa or Cho Bump-set is a more appropriate nickname for this player. She lacks the two fundamental skills for a setter: footspeed and tossing... The fact that she's widely viewed as the third best in her country (although Ahn Hye-jin is right there) is really telling about the quality of setters in Korea. As a setter, it's your job to get to the ball, to fix a bad ball. Speedy Da-yeong does it well. If you want to kill IBK, just target the hell out of Pyo Seung-joo on the serve, Cho Song-hwa slowly chases after the ball, bump sets the ball to Lazareva, opponent already prepared, so the ball ends with a block. The slowest setter + the worst receiving team is a dangerous, if not exciting combination. She needs to work on her backsets. Put the ball higher man!

Pyo Seung-joo played a strong game today. Perhaps her best game of the year. When she's on a good run, she can give you 15 pts easy. What's frustrating about her is that she can really step up at times and give you a solid all-around game (like during that match against Belgium). But when her reception starts to shake a little, she tends to also get erratic on the attack and it starts a negative spiral. If she can improve that mental aspect of her game, IBK will be good.

Big shout out to Yuk Seo-young. What a gem! Here's a second-year player in her first full season as a starter playing like a veteran. Super underappreciated because she doesn't have the "visual" of other young fandom friendly players. The best OH prospect since Kang So-hwi. She'll probably end up with better stats as a second-year than "second-year So-hwi" since she'll have more responsibilities with IBK. Her reception is improving day by day. She has guts and plays powerfully. What she lacks is just experience (and perhaps a better vertical jump). She still makes a lot of errors with the serve. You don't need to go for the ace 100% of the time! You should take into account the timing and your team's situation in the game. Sometimes it's better to just play it safe, slightly put it above the net than go for the kill and finish with a beom sil instead...

I think my comments are definitely not as insightful as econmtl's analysis but I still wanted to write down some thoughts.

Heungkuk players were kind of asleep in the first set, apart from maybe LDY who seemed very alert and quick from the get-go, but both LJY and KYK looked really off in that first set and Diouf just fired the spikes over like there was no tomorrow.

KYK woke up in the second set and really won that set for Heungkuk with help from LDY, she fixed several bad receives that went over the net and immediately got blasted back at them by blocking/deflecting them. Towards the end of the set she saved two Diouf spikes, one with her face lol.

LJY also woke up in the third set while KGC completely tilted of the surface of planet Earth. LDY even got one of her signature dumps in as well as one block. The rally before that block KGC Coach video-challenged a alleged net-touch by LDY - it turned out her ponytail whipped the net while she was turning after blocking (this has happened before, just recently)

Her reaction to the video-challenge:

Well at that point the score was 21-9 and the set was pretty much done and dusted.

In the fourth set KGC fought again but ultimately couldnt overcome the now fully-awakened Heungkuk, atleast not with just one threat - Diouf.

Heungkuk really made it more interesting by throwing that first set lol and then absolutely whacking their opponents 25-11 in Set 3.

At the end I really thought LDY would get Match MVP, after all she scored 6 points - 3 attack points/dumps, 2 blocks and 1 service ace, but it ended up going to KYK which I am also ok with, after all the W is all that matters and KYK looked very strong from the second set onwards.

Thanks for coming to my TED Talk.