Sheffield spoil ‘Castle opener (16/09/06)

Newcastle (Staffs) 1 – 3 Sheffield (20-25, 23-25, 25-20, 19-25)

Mens Division 1

Newcastle (Staffs) opened up their 2006-07 National League campaign with
a tricky match against Sheffield, whose squad is entirely composed of
England Junior, under 23 and senior internationals, indeed the majority
of their squad spent the previous weekend in Italy playing for the under
23 team. ‘Castle themselves have spent the off-season securing an
improved squad for this season with James Cooper and Mark Speake
transferring from the relegated Loughborough and Sam Bragg remaining at
the club for a 4th season despite the interest of other clubs. However,
without their injured player coach Ant Viggars ‘Castle’s preparations
were slightly disrupted.

The large crowd saw a nightmare start for ‘Castle with Sheffield’s
Kieran O’Malley jump float serving the home team into an early time-out
at 6-0 down. However, from this disappointing opening the first set
became a competitive affair with neither team able to put together a run
of point scoring attacks, giving the crowd plenty of interest with
‘Castle setter Jon Pennock linking fluidly with each of his attackers.
Frustratingly for ‘Castle the difference between the teams had not
increased by the end of the set, showing that their poor start has cost
them badly as Sheffield took a 1-0 lead.

The 2nd set continued where first had left-off, with the teams trading
side-outs with high levels of commitment in defence regularly pushing
rallies into third and fourth phases. There was somewhat a tit-for-tat
feel to the set as first Sheffield and then ‘Castle gained the upper
hand. A strong run of jump float serves from ‘Castle captain Will
Roberts led a strong spell for the home team mid-way through the set,
but as his opposition counterpart Kieran O’Malley again had his turn at
the service line he turned the screw on ‘Castle receiver Dave Lovell by
again serving jump float bullets low over the net down the line. Neither
team could find the key unlocking the other and ‘Castle found themselves
23-22 up, only for Sheffield to turn the tables with three consecutive
points to win 25-23 and take a 2-0 lead.

At 2-0 down coach Ant Viggars was compelled to change something in the
line-up and despite a good display Jon Pennock was withdrawn from the
line-up in favour of England under 23 player Sam Bragg who performed
well and linked strongly with power hitter James Cooper who lit up the
night with a spell of consecutive kills from front and back court.
‘Castle coped much better with Sheffield’s sustained tactic of serving
on Dave Lovell and took the upper hand in the third set as Lovell
responded well. Such was Sheffield’s focus on serving on one receiver
that the statistic showed he passed 80% of the serves on the night,
leaving fellow wing-man Richard Guest almost redundant. After the
disappointment of losing a close 2nd set, a well won 3rd left the match
in the balance.

Unfortunately for ‘Castle their intensity could not be maintained and
the fourth set became a rather bitty affair which Sheffield ultimately
won with relative ease to take the match 3-1. Sheffield’s young team
contains a number of talented young players who will be looking towards
the London 2012 Olympics with a clear ambition to be on court and this
team may well upset a few sides this season, but ‘Castle can take
confidence from their performance into their next match at Keele
University next Saturday (23rd September) against Cambridge.

Will Roberts