VOLLEYBALL
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AGAINST strong opposition Western were happy to find a win from their opening five games of the girls CHS Volleyball Championships at the Bathurst Indoor Sports Stadium.
Western overcame Hunter 25-19, for their sole win in those first five games and came close to finding more.
Against the North Coast and Sydney East sides, Western fought back to take the second set 25-23 before going down in the decider.
The assessment of the Western performance so far from coach Maureen Dixon was glowing.
“This is a pretty new team. Western had a very strong team for a few years and they got fourth in the state last year. There’s only three back from that team, and two of those were actually reserves last year who have only just stepped up into the starting six this year. The rest are absolute newbies,” she said.
“We’ve only won one of our matches so far, but we’ve been competitive in every match. We haven’t copped a flogging in any of them and we’ve had two three-setters.
“The team have gelled and played really well together. They’ve enjoyed it and really worked as a team. It’s just that lack of match experience at this level.”
The Western squad of 10 players is taken from only two schools this year – seven from Blayney High School and three from Kelso High School.
Western only have one Year 12 player in the side, Blayney’s Kodi Fuller, meaning the remainder of the team have the opportunity to come back next year and apply what they’ve learned from this outing.
“In the past we’ve had kids from West Wyalong so trying to get together to train has been very difficult, but this year it’s been very good. Each of the kids are training at their own school as well,” Dixon said.
“This year we have one Year 12 girl, seven Year 11s, a Year 8 girl and a Year 9 girl so there’s a good mix there. Western’s always been strong and we used to have West Wyalong, Dubbo, Blayney and Kelso as the strongest sides but ... the top volleyballers now are coming from Blayney High and Kelso High.”
“Our kids have improved with every game. We’re now in rallies that we would have gotten beaten in yesterday and now we’re actually having 10-shot rallies, which is fantastic.”
Western wrap up their tournament today with matches against North West (11.15am) and Sydney South West (12.45pm).
