Posts by Joana

Quote from "joanamss"

I was really sad for Serbia....definetly deserve moer then that!!!
Joana...Do you think Spasojevic will come back in time???

I don't know... She's on painkillers, I don't think she'll be at 100% even if she plays. It's really unfortunate, but absolutely no excuse for today's loss, the whole team was horrible. Even the usually most reliable players like Citakovic were pitiful. I think the pressure is getting to them, last year nobody expected anything from them and now they are among the favourites, I think they still don't know how to cope with it.

Russia beat Croatia 3-0. I'm watching the match right now, Russia is far from impressive.

Quote from "scarpetta"

what happened to Spasojevic?

She's injured. She is with the rest of the team in Belgium though and is expected to play later.

Slovakia def. Serbia 3-2

Embarrassing, really. Even without Djerisilo and Spasojevic they should have handled this rather easily. Big thumbs down to pretty much the whole team, no power in the attack (Nikolic ) and worthless defence. Also pretty much non-existing block today.

Well done to Slovakia, they are a nice, disciplined team that fights courageously.

This reminds me so much of Zagreb two years ago... They'd play one perfect set and then a total collapse. I thought they had got some stability since then, but no.

Serbia is falling apart.

I found the Croatian roster:

Setters:
Diana Rescic
Ana Grbac

Blockers:
Mirela Delic
Ilijana Dugandzic
Ivana Milos

Opposite hitters:
Katarina Barun
Jelena Alajbeg

Outside hitters:
Marina Miletic
Zrinka Petrovic
Sanja Popovic
Paola Dosen

Libero:
Lucija Cigic

They could have had a very strong team but this way they'll be happy to even win a set.

Quote from "zik013"

funny how i cant find a single word about women volley in croatian media

Tell me about it... It's mission impossible. Anyway, it starts tomorrow so we'll see who plays.

Croatian HRT+ will show the games of Croatian team live. The matches will also be replayed on HTV2 around midnight.

Spasojevic as the opposite hitter. I doubt we'll see her much on that position but it's equally bad to leave just Brakocevic there. She's SO unstable.
I'm not too happy with the choice of middle blockers. Citakovic and Krsmanovic are obviously lock-ins (I really think both are world class) but I don't think Isailovic should be there yet. Aleksandra Rankovic and Aleksandra Avramovic would be better options, not to mention Sladjana Eric. I don't know why Eric wasn't selected, she played in Montreux but wasn't called afterwards.

I wonder what happened to Sanja Starovic... She was so promising a few years ago but her career just went nowhere. Had she continued to progress she would have been of great help to this team.

Quote from "Nastja"

and about russian hmm Tatu :oops: BUT dont laugh guys! they might be very commercial but their lyrics are really nice (at least the russian ones ;))

You don't need to feel embarrassed. Tatu is perfect pop music. :wink2: Yeah, it's manufactured music, but about as good manufactured music as it gets. They're cool with me.

Speaking of Russian pop, I like the new Via Gra song.

Bulgaria def. Turkey 3-0 Nice effort from the hosts in the last two games.
Italy def. Russia 3-1

Germany, Turkey and Italy have qualified.

GP without Russia just doesn't seem right. :?

Germany def. Serbia 3-1
Serbia is out. That's too bad, but they only have themselves to blame. They really should have beaten Italy.

I have no doubt that Turkey will beat Bulgaria, so the winner of Italy vs Russia will be the 3rd team to qualify for GP.

Quote from "Matthias"

Joana, do you know why Grbac refused to play in Junior WCH?

I really don't. I don't even know what match it was. It's very difficult to find information on Croatian women's volleyball, on the Internet at least. Few people are interested in it now that Barbara Jelic is gone.

Anyway, Mia Jerkov will not play at the EC as well. Apparently she stopped playing volleyball.

I tried to find out more about Grbac's case and whether she's been suspended, but no luck so far.

Hm, I've been doing some calculations and it looks like this victory has put Germany through. They can't be caught now, so Turkey and Germany have qualified.
Now, provided that Italy beats Bulgaria today, they are two scenarios:

1) Serbia loses tomorrow. In that case the winner of Russia vs Italy goes through.
2) Serbia wins. In that case they are certainly going through because they will have better sets ratio than Italy or will have more sets won than Russia.

I hope this is correct. :?

Edit: If Serbia wins 3-2 tomorrow, but Russia wins 3-0, Russia will go through. If Serbia wins 3-1 or 3-0, they will have qualified no matter the Russian score.

Blah, this is so annoying. I'll just wait and see what happens tomorrow.

Russia (without Gamova and Godina) def. Azerbaijan 3-2
Germany def. Turkey 3-0 Some resistance

Jeez, it's very complicated now. Serbia has to beat Germany to have a chance. Germany may go through even if they lose. The winner of Italy vs Russia will have a chance to qualify, but the loser will be eliminated.
I guess it will all come down to the won/lost sets ratio.

Quote from "samba player"

Anyway thanks for your great work about teams composition.
Don't you think that the Italian Champions is loosing some quality. I mean we've lost Fofao, Walewska, Aguero, Spasojevic, Erika and other good players. But on the other hand thanks to Guidetti a lot of good German players came (Furst, Kozuch, Radzuweit).

Well, Spasojevic left because she felt it was too physically and mentally demanding to play so many games in such a short period of time. Jelena Nikolic was also pretty annoyed with the League Cup system that was introduced this year because she thought it was too tiring and essentially meaningless. I don't know if that applies to all the players that are leaving the league, but they might think about changing the system a bit. If it is indeed too tough on the body to play so much, and you can get good money elsewhere, it's logical that they leave.

I don't have the exact Croatian roster, but I can tell you that Osmokrovic, Poljak and Usic decided to skip this EC. That pretty much does it for Croatia, they have almost no chance of doing something big here. Also there's a problem with Ana Grbac, she may be suspended for refusing to play a match at this year's junior WC. It probably won't happen though, as Croatia only has one setter available (Gligorovic) and they need a back-up so I expect she'll play.

Belgium will play without De Carne and Mouha. A big blow for the hosts.

As for Serbia, if Djerisilo was playing, I'd expect a medal for sure. But without her it will be difficult. Her replacement Brakocevic is very talented, but young and experienced and prone to making a number of errors in a row. Serbian attack is very limited now, I'm not a fan of Nikolic, and Spasojevic has a problem with a number of lingering injuries, and I don't think they'll be able to repeat what they did in Japan. But, one can always hope...

Unbelievable that Serbia had match points in EVERY match they played so far and still may not qualify. I can't get over that meltdown against Italy, but I think they have a good chance against Germany. Damn, if only Djerisilo was here...

I don't think it has much to do with religion or history. Generally those things are less important in women's sports, and besides, Serbia and Turkey get along reasonably well now. After all, Djerisilo and Citakovic played in Eczacibasi last season and the fans loved them.

I think there are two possible reasons for this rivalry:

1) In youth team volleyball we have these Balkan championships and since Serbia and Turkey are by far the best teams on Balkan, they meet each other in the finals all the time. Naturally, a rivalry is born that way and perhaps some of it also extends to senior competition.

2) This might be even more important: at the GP qualies last year Turkey and Serbia met in the 3rd match of the group stage. Turkey needed a win to go through, while Serbia was out and couldn't qualify no matter what. Despite that the Serbs fought like crazy (they were on a really bad losing streak, having lost all the friendly games that summer and the previous two matches at the GP qualies, and needed a win to reassure themselves), and eventually beat Turkey thus eliminating them from GP. Apparently the Turkish players were pretty bitter after that.

And who knows, there may be something personal between the players that we're not aware of.