Portugal and the first 6 matches!

Well it's been a long time since i've posted...no excuse just being really really lazy. So i've been in portugal almost 2 months now and i'm pretty settled! Still dont have a bed (just a matress on the floor) and only just got a second dresser so i don't have my clothes all over the ground...but other than that it's all good.

Porto is a nice town, nice little riverfront cafes and some decent shopping, tend tgo head there on the days off to go have a look around. Especially the first few weeks when the weather was puching 30! Its only like 22 these days! Myself and Nigel alos went further south to Esphino to check out the beach there, it was pretty nice and I would love to be there to see the beach volleyball world tour event they host!

So now to Volleyball, we have had an interesting start to the season. Our 1 opposite Jeremy was not fully fit due to surgery so i was thrown into that position until he was better and we got our 2nd opposite out from Brazil. On top of that our starting setter was out with a torn ab.....so he is only just starting to get back to full shape now. We played a few mini pre-season tournaments, one was a disaster and one was a little better.

First up in the regualr season we had Benfica. Normally always a top 3 team, there are well known for buying a lot of Brazilians and having a lot of money! This is porbably because they are affiliated with the Benfica soccer club, there stadium is a part of the football stadium. So going into the game we were a little worried about getting absolutelly smashed! However it didn't turn out that way. We went in with a nothing to lose philosiphy and we played some decent volleyball, winning the 2nd to 17 and losing the 4th 25-23. All in all it was a close game. I was especially pleased with how I played, managed to score a lot of points at a good %.

In the Portuguese league it's not uncommon to play 2 games a weekend. So after our 3 hour bus ride home we played at home the next day against Villacondense. We were expected to win this game easily and after winning the first set it looked like we would. We unexpectedly lost the 2nd and the fought back to win the third to about 17. Then from then on it was a bit of a disaster! We werent able to put the ball to the ground, it was one of these games wher everything seemed to go right for the other team. Finding the floor, hitting the right part of the block, making big digs of their feet, shoulders, stomachs etc. And it was the opposite for us. We lost the last 2 sets badly and we all felt pretty shitty after the game as you might expect.
The third match was a travel match to the Azores Islands, about 2000km off the coast of Portugal. Fonte Bastardo the team we were playing are tipped to be around the 4th-5th mark after the big 3 teams at the end of the regular season. So it was important for us to get a win. Unfortunatelly it didn't happen. It was a weird game, I think we were ahead every set only to lose it right at the end. I think the fact that we were such a new team didn't give us the confidence to finish the set off. Bastardo were solid, but by no means special. It was a dissapointing win and then to top it off we had a disastorous travle home, flying to Lisbon and driving to Porto, getting home at about 530am!!!

The next week was another travel week to the Madeira Islands. The Maderia's were beautiful, Nigel and myself managed to get a lot of good pictures. Unfortunatelly we didn't get to see much of the capital Funchal! However we were here for Volleyball. The first match against Maritimo went how it should of. We dominated them, if it wasn't for a few lapses in concentration at the end of the sets the scoreline could of been much nicer for us. However a win was a win and it was great to get the monkey of our back.

The next day we played Machico, after coming from Maritimo which had a brand new gym (with no crowd) it was very different entering the stadium. To be honest the court is pretty much concrete with a thin layer of wood across it! Punishing on the knees. However a vocal crowd with drums and what not gave the game a lively atmosphere. They also had a bit to cheer about as we threw away a decent lead and 3 set points to lose the first. Again we started the better in the 2nd, only again for us to almost throw away the lead right at the end to only scrape over the line 25-23 after the opposition player doubled a transition set. The next 2 sets were better, especially the 4th which we won to about 16. So 2 from 2 in Madeira and we were back on our feet...ok so maybe our knees!

Last match so far this season was last Saturday against Academico Esphino. Academico is your traditional non-physical slightly unorthadox scrambling team, who when get on a run can cause some damage. Essentially we played 3 decent sets and 1 bad set. We lost the 2nd set to 13!!!!! However we did what we had to do to get over the line. Was also good to see Nigel get some kills...he may of even smiled at one stage during the match...AMAZING! This week we got Emoriz on thursday and a tough one against last years champions Sporting Esphino.

Also in other very important news we bought a table tennis table to relieve the boredom during the day. Currently Aden is the #1 ranked player. Generally due to his good defence and smart strategic attacking shots. My game is based purely on my erratic forehand (I have no backhand) If my forehand is on watch out... if not I may as well just stop playing. So I think by the end of the year we are going to be semi-pro Ping Pong players as well as Volleyballers!

So 1 more week in Portugal here and I'm back to Australia to train for the World Cup in Japan! Im really excited about playing the best teams in the world and gettting some good wins in Japan. So keep looking for reports on those matches!