VE U15 girls Grand Prix Tier 1, Round 1 Pool C

Woodchurch High School, 12 noon to 3:00pm

Team: Katie Leppington, Eisha Chahal, Imi Newall, Abi Larway,  Lily Prosser, Ella Overall, Yan Xi Chen, Helena Hinch, Nina Karyampudi.

Results: 

Wirral vs Newcastle Staffs - won 2-1, 25-15, 15-25, 16-14

Wirral vs Urmston Grammar A - lost 0-2, 9-25, 17-25

Wirral vs Manchester Marvels - won 2-0, 25-19, 25-18

Our junior teams have been doing us proud in the first round of Volleyball England Grand Prix events and the U15 girls were no exception, finishing 2nd in a strong Tier 1 pool.

Our girls dominated the opening set in their first match against Newcastle Staffs but then forgot how to serve and lost the second badly. We’d fallen behind in the third set and looked like losing the game when Ella came round to serve and won the game for us by serving out the set from 8-14 down. Great serving, wonderful to hold her nerve under pressure.

The second match was against Urmston Grammar A, the strongest team in the competition, with expectations to finish in the top three nationally. Their powerful serving overwhelmed our pass as they took the first set to 9. But, credit to our girls, they didn’t give up. They fought hard throughout the second set and showed signs of starting to unpick the Urmston defence with tips, nice hits across the block, targetted deep balls, and one lovely hit down the line from Abi. The game was lost 2-0 but our girls gave a creditable performance against a very strong team.

Marvels made the mistake  in the 3rd match by starting their bench players to give them a game and by the time the stronger players were substituted in it was too late to save the first set. The second set was closer but Wirral led throughout and Yan Xi was able to close out the match with a run of 5 serves at the death.

Sorry no photos again - too preoccupied with coaching and organising I’m afraid.

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Late news from EVA results page

Following Sunday’s games Wirral U15s are 6th in the overall national standings and qualify for the silver pool in Round 2. We’ll be playing Stourbridge, Boswells and Wessex in the next round on Sunday, March 6th - venue to be announced.