China NT 2023

Those MB stats are great, WYY has really established herself as a reliable and impressive MB and Wu Mengjie's stats show she is ready to get a starting spot

SRB did save CB position by donating 8.44 pts in the irrelevant match, a poisonous gift for it helps retaining the bad general... otherwise a 4 losses in a streak will certainly catch more of the spotlight! Through the OQT the CHN team proved itself under the incompetent head coach that the team is great only at the Asian level (I still believe the team will remain be the Queen of Asia even though the JPN team sends its A team to the Asian Games, and even the bad OH WYL is still great at the Asian level) but that's all, at the World stage, the team under the current general is a bad team, uncompetitive squad!! Indeed there is no bad soldiers, only bad generals! I feel pity for all those good players that all their hard works and golden ages were wasted by bad leadership! For the sake of the Chinese Women's Volleyball Team CVA needs to have a new head coach within this current cycle, and revamp some members of the core NT, remove all the bad apples! I hope they don't wait further until the next debacle in Paris OG to take decision. I lose hope under the current general, the team will lose all the battles that really matter against any competent team even the relatively newcomer CAN -- even if the team eventually can make it to Paris OG by WR, under the current head coach, the team will be hopeless for any good result. Hopefully someone or more with authority will pay attention and makes the drastic adjustment to save the team at the World level, not being deceived or complacent by the almost certain good outcome at the Asian Games. Otherwise, the current cycle will be wasted one more time!

I agree that WYL, ZH must go from the NT A, hopefully ZT will rejoin the team in 2024, and call in Zhuang Yushan ASAP. Try other setters if the current ones are not good enough. A new head coach right after the Asian Games, regardless the outcome! The team should be grander than merely being the Asian Queen!

Btw, have idea who will be suitable to take the role as the NT head coach?

Quote from fire_cai_bin

Agree with everything you have said. Wang Baoquan, An Jiajie, even the U21 coach.... all better than Cai.

Some people make fun of An Jiajie because he is incompetent compared to Lang Ping, but An Jiajie beat Italy's A team and beat Turkey in the rematch in 2019 VNL finals.

He did not have Zhu Ting, Zhang Changning, Li Yingying, Yuan Xinyue, Yan Ni, Ding Xia, Zeng Chunlei, and Wang Mengjie available. Who can Cai Bin beat with the B team? Nobody...

Anyone will be less shiny with Lang Ping being at the center, incl. An. Even if the team had debacle in Tokyo OG, I would still refrain myself from blaming her in view of her lifelong VB career, sacrifices (suffering incl. the surgery) and contribution to rebuild the team post the debacle in London OG! Regardless all the bitter feelings I took it as the unfortunate fateful timing that Zhu suffered severe injury around the event... quite fateful along with the virus tragedy. My only minor criticism about her was at the 2018 WCH when the team had chance to pick up the opponent in the SF that the team still went ahead full force vs. NED to top the group to face ITA i/o SRB in the SF (back then SRB already topped the other half)... but as a former very successful player herself perhaps Lang Ping had the 100% uncompromised full-faith like religion (thus sometimes she appeared as if being too naive) to avoid the craftier "tactical ways" to achieve good results unlike some other key figures!

Thru the OQT the current head coach showed his outright incompetence in fielding players (e.g. the obvious blindness of playing WYL as starter), making substitutions and calling time out. Need a better general to uplift the actually still competent resources (just need some changes with the current personnel). Of course a quality head coach will also need to identify and nurture new young potential players to supplant the next cycles in order to maintain sustainable achievements across generations! Hope for the wisdom and vision to have a future! 🙏🏼

Quote from fire_cai_bin

The stats speak for themselves.

I think the stats only tell half the story... the problems she created affect the overall performance and team morale. She disrupts the flow and rhythm of the team. Setters avoid her and as a result LYY is exhausted by being overused and is always targeted by blockers.

This was what happened in the last point in the 5 setter against Canada. People are saying the ball should've gone to Wu in position 4 instead of LYY for a backrow attack... but for Diao, WYL was the one usually there (position 4) and she (Diao) was just instinctively, avoiding WYL, not realising Wu had replaced her.

China vs Iran in the Asian Games Men's Volleyball gold medal match tonight 🏅... 1930 gmt+8. Will post links (if any) in the Asian games thread.

19th Asian Games - Hangzhou 2022 (23 Sept - 8 Oct 2023) - Women’s Volleyball Tournament (30 Sept - 7 Oct)

Yesterday, in the S-finals, China beat Japan 'B' team 3-0.

Quote from Julian Chow

I think the stats only tell half the story... the problems she created affect the overall performance and team morale. She disrupts the flow and rhythm of the team. Setters avoid her and as a result LYY is exhausted by being overused and is always targeted by blockers.

This was what happened in the last point in the 5 setter against Canada. People are saying the ball should've gone to Wu in position 4 instead of LYY for a backrow attack... but for Diao, WYL was the one usually there (position 4) and she (Diao) was just instinctively, avoiding WYL, not realising Wu had replaced her.

REALLY, under the tough competition with other strong teams, the team can not have a core element like the 2nd OH with the apparent weakness!! It will create a Big Hole when that player becomes a tame one and ineffective. Opposing team will exploit the weakness, and the Chinese team will suffer, as seen against CAN and also the NED. I am not an expert on the technical aspects of volleyball, but it's still obvious for me that WYL pulled down the team, and the head coach was so incompetent did very little to fix the situation as early as possible!

May I remind everyone here, each time a player fails to kill the ball by playing "softly" (various ineffective hits), that player hands over that killing opportunity to the opposing team. That's what I saw from WYL being on court, hitting many times with "ineffective hits". A good player in her position will have killed the ball or put the opponent in a difficult, defensive position. A player of WYL quality will certainly sink the team, that's what happened in this OQT. And as Chow said, in a balanced team without the obvious hole, the setter may distribute the attacks to each position at any time she deems as having the best winning chance. But if the head coach put an inferior starter player there, in that position 4, then setter prefers to avoid that bad player, it creates a BIG HOLE, every one being not blind will see this flaw, let alone the prof. coach of the opposing team... myself is a lazy person to delve into all the technical matters still I can see clearly the hole when I watch the match... OMG... OMG... how can the team have such incompetent coach??? I'll be more empathetic if there is no other competent player to act as a sub.

Team will not prosper under the dumb leadership! The Team will just sink as long as the commander issue is not fixed! It is so disappointing to learn and watching all these problems manifesting themselves.

And the spots being occupied by those bad apples in NT will deny other prospective potential players from joining. In optimizing the potential power of the NT, things like this cannot be allowed to happen, moreover in a prolonged period. Also the club clique or club centric matter and other regional things need to be pushed out... club and league exist first of all to support the NT. It needs strong leadership with the national-level vision and guidelines and decisions, all for the best, optimum resources for the National Team! But sadly, perhaps it needs another debacle to wake up those with authority!

Quote from fire_cai_bin

let's hope that thailand can do something at asian games then. Otherwise, if we wait until VNL, Cai might find a way to get us out of the olympics...

There is no other Asian team that can beat the Chinese NT A full line-up, the last time it happened was in London 2012 , and it's still true nowadays, for any tournament in Asia that China deems as important. As I mentioned a couple of time, even WYL is still a good player in the Asian-level competition, she becomes effective when facing the Asian opponents. I just don't see any changes to such equilibrium. Japanese team know this well, that's why they avoided to send their A team to the Asian Games... they know China will certainly send full A team to the Asian Games... when was the last time Japan sent their A team to the Asian Games competition?

I just checked a bit, the last time Japan won the Women's Volleyball championship in the Asian Games was in 1978 in Bangkok. Since that time, China only missed twice to win the championship titles, 1994 in Hiroshima and 2014 in Incheon, both taken by the South Korea. And I recall that in 2014 Lang Ping did not send her A team to the Asian Games... she had the WCH in Italy!

Quote from Julian Chow

China vs Iran in the Asian Games Men's Volleyball gold medal match tonight 🏅... 1930 gmt+8. Will post links (if any) in the Asian games thread.

19th Asian Games - Hangzhou 2022 (23 Sept - 8 Oct 2023) - Women’s Volleyball Tournament (30 Sept - 7 Oct)

Yesterday, in the S-finals, China beat Japan 'B' team 3-0.

Iran 3:1 China

tomen

Iran is a higher ranked team, so it's not a big surprise, but how many times have China taken taken a 1:0 or 2:0 lead but eventually lose the match ?

Quote from Julian Chow

Iran 3:1 China

tomen

Iran is a higher ranked team, so it's not a big surprise, but how many times have China taken taken a 1:0 or 2:0 lead but eventually lose the match ?

It is the same as Chinese women's basketball NT. Due to lose to Japan for many times, the highest power will not exist. Zhang Jing-yin, Peng Shi-kun and so on have been famous second-rate players in the world but they still need more time to improve themselves though time couldn't wait for any players such as Igor Omrcen, Slovenian old players, Chinese male volleyballers and so on.

Cai Bin, WYL and the Asian Games

The women’s volleyball tournament will start in 2 days time and it looks like CB will be there with WYL despite all that’s said here and elsewhere. Their ‘story’ likely began early last year. It could be that someone was keen to see WYL in the 2022 Asian Games. It’s always an honour to represent your country, and extra special when you’re the host. What more when they have a good chance of winning gold. However, WYL needed to be in the A team first, so she was picked for the VNL, despite never ever impressing anyone with her skills, even in the CVL. However the Games were unexpectedly postponed till 2023, and WYL was back in the VNL 2023, despite performing poorly in 2022.

CB probably thinks LYY, Gong, WYY and a few others would be good enough to win matches, so WYL played in the VNL and OQT, with the Asian Games being the main target. Why did CB leave out outstanding players like Zhuang YS and randomly picked some other players to make up the team ? I think it’s just to make WYL look good and keep her in the starting six. If Zhuang YS was there, It would be hard to explain why WYL is playing.

We don’t know what exactly happened, but eventually the truth will come out. There is a Chinese proverb.... 纸包不住火 - Paper cannot wrap fire.

Win gold or not, I hope it’s the last time we see CB (& WYL). Please, just leave the job of qualifying for the Olympics to real coaches and our top players.

Watching the men's vb final was depressing, and the cyclists in track cycling also didn't do well. 😕

But at least they're winning many events in swimming.. 🏅 🥇 🏅 🥇....

Also, our swimmers are so pleasant looking like 'Butterfly Queen' Zhang Yufei 张雨霏 who is the darling of the swimming fans and 18yo Yu Yiting 余依婷

Quote from Julian Chow

Cai Bin, WYL and the Asian Games

The women’s volleyball tournament will start in 2 days time and it looks like CB will be there with WYL despite all that’s said here and elsewhere. Their ‘story’ likely began early last year. It could be that someone was keen to see WYL in the 2022 Asian Games. It’s always an honour to represent your country, and extra special when you’re the host. What more when they have a good chance of winning gold. However, WYL needed to be in the A team first, so she was picked for the VNL, despite never ever impressing anyone with her skills, even in the CVL. However the Games were unexpectedly postponed till 2023, and WYL was back in the VNL 2023, despite performing poorly in 2022.

CB probably thinks LYY, Gong, WYY and a few others would be good enough to win matches, so WYL played in the VNL and OQT, with the Asian Games being the main target. Why did CB leave out outstanding players like Zhuang YS and randomly picked some other players to make up the team ? I think it’s just to make WYL look good and keep her in the starting six. If Zhuang YS was there, It would be hard to explain why WYL is playing.

We don’t know what exactly happened, but eventually the truth will come out. There is a Chinese proverb.... 纸包不住火 - Paper cannot wrap fire.

Win gold or not, I hope it’s the last time we see CB (& WYL). Please, just leave the job of qualifying for the Olympics to real coaches and our top players.

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There must be something hocus pocus going on between either CB and WYL or WYL and an assistant or someone who has authority in CVL. Can’t help to have this thoughts when it is obvious WYL is not the right player a mediocre one when there are a few who are better than her. Tournament after tournament her performances were mostly negative effects to the team. If there is some sort of illicit affair going on, it should be called out and be banished.

Only a rumor: The first overseas head coach of Chinese women's senior NT will be shown in 2024 perhaps. Even he will be a Japanese...

Who believes it?

Quote from fire_cai_bin

benchwarmer  Julian Chow I guess you don't know that her dad is a high-ranking official in the PLA. Bayi even cut the coach instead of her when there was a dispute and she bragged about it.

So she has a lot of pull behind the scene. Who could the person backing her up? The person must be a top official. Maybe if she is the relative of President Xi, who can deny her. This is bad for the moral of the athletes and coaches.