Bronze for Grafing's U16 youth with a "faint aftertaste"
Created: 05/06/2022, 12:00 p.m
Special award: Grafing's Joshua Huber received a jersey from BR Volleys middle blocker Georg Klein as the best middle blocker in the DM.
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The disappointment about the semi-final bankruptcy, but above all the frustration because of the supposed disadvantage by the referees ran deep.
There was dead silence in the changing room of the TSV Grafing U16 volleyball juniors for several minutes.
Grafing
– Then someone switched on the jukebox and Peter Schilling's "Major Tom" let the mood rocket that had crashed start again.
"Little by little, the boys became proud of the bronze medal at their first German championships," said Grafing's U16 trainer Fabian Siegel.
The fact that the bronze rank, which Grafing shares with TSC Berlin, was not played out in the youth finals was comforting.
"Both teams were mentally too battered to play."
With a good 40-strong family fan group, the TSV youngsters hit the Horst-Korber-Sportzentrum, within walking distance of the Berlin Olympic Stadium.
Siegel noticed that his protégés were very nervous at the start of the tournament in the 3,500-seat training hall of the BR Volleys.
After completing two compulsory tasks against Baden and Erfurt, however, the Bärenstadt team won the group against Eimsbüttel with a "remarkably dominant" touch.
Hooked on the previous evening's championship spectacle in the Max-Schmeling-Halle (see extra report), Grafinger ran really hot after a poor start to the quarterfinals against Kriftel and were even able to compensate for the first severe setback: diagonal player Tristan Mohr twisted his ankle and injured his lateral ligament.
"The sticking point of the day.
Everyone was shocked, but wanted to fight even harder to turn the game around for Tristan and win," said Siegel proudly of the 2-0 morale success and semi-final entry.
Minimum target achieved.
"However, it is extremely unfortunate that the two best teams are already meeting in the semi-finals," Siegel also had to replace his injured top performer before the showdown with organizer SCC Berlin.
Setter Matti Burmann moved to diagonal, his substitute Tim Kaupa in the starting lineup.
"Tim did an excellent job, at the same time the wingers Mika Takano and Robin Bein took enormous pressure from the Berliners."
The tactically changed Grafinger held their ground and were in the lead 22:19 in the first set.
"And then we are extremely disadvantaged by three crystal-clear wrong decisions by the referee and lose 24:26," complained Siegel, who later analyzed the scenes several times in the video.
Berlin's quarter-final opponent Friedrichshafen also complained about "several borderline decisions" in favor of the hosts.
In addition to the frustration of the referee, there was also a 6:10 deficit in the second set before libero Simon Paster, blockers Joshua Huber, Emil Mayershofer and Janno Jell shone.
"We're coming back so strong and at 19:18 we again have two questionable decisions against us," Siegel even saw a yellow card for complaining.
The later title winner drew "of course not undeservedly" with 25:20 in the final against Unterhaching, "whom we have always beaten".
However, it took a train ride for the “faint aftertaste” of the semifinals to give way to pride in bronze.
"Now the boys are even more motivated to beat Berlin next year," believes Siegel after an "overall very nice weekend in Berlin." bj
The Grafinger U16s cheer together with players from the German champions (back, from left): Georg Klein (BR Volleys), Tristan Mohr (injured), Matti Burmann, Janno Jell, Robin Bein, Joshua Huber, Emil Mayershofer, Lukas Broghammer (co- Trainer), Marek Sotola and Matthew West (both BR Volleys) and (from left to right) Fabian Siegel (Trainer), Nehemiah Mote (BR Volleys), Fabian Singer, Lian Halm, Mika Takano, Simon Paster, Mats Löffler and Tim Kaupa .
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