2018-2019 Men’s French Ligue A – Week 1
Montpellier Def. Narbonne 3-1 (22-25, 25-18, 25-22, 25-21)
- Chaban-Delmas Castelnau-le-Lez
- Attendance: 1450
- Monptellier starts at 1-0 with 3 points; Narbonne slips to 0-1 with 0 points
Levi Cabral opened the season with Monpellier in a big way with 21 points in a 3-1 win. The Brazilian outside hitter, who played a Cal Baptist University, finished the match with 21 points on 20 kills and a block. His 20 kills came with a .400 hitting percentage (49%). Thiago Sens also contributed 16 points from 14 kills and 2 blocks. Their production and efficiency on the left side made up for the struggles on the right. Their opposite, Jean Patry, scored 10 points with 4 aces, and a block. His 5 kills came among 8 errors and left him with a -.158 attack average (26%). Javier Gonzalez set the team to a 49% attack efficiency.
Aprad Baroti scored 17 points to lead Narbonne on 11 kills, 3 blocks, and 3 aces from the opposite position. Byron Keturakis, their setter, got more production from the middles than the outside hitters. Jean-Philippe Sol and Alejandro Vigil both scored 10 points and both finished with 7 kills. Sol did not commit and attack error and hit .875 (88%).
Tours Def. Cannes 3-1 (25-16, 20-25, 25-22, 25-22)
- Robert Grenon Hall
- Attendance: 2806
- Tours is 1-0 with 3 points; Narbonne falls to 0-1 with 0 points
Tours began their title defense with solid performances from many of their players in a 3-1 victory. Hermans Egleskans led the way from the opposite position with 20 points. He put away 17 kills with a .316 hitting percentage (45%) and also chipped in 3 blocks. Nathan Wounembania scored 11 points on 8 kills, 2 blocks, and 1 ace. The outside hitter committed 6 attack errors and only posted a 36% (.091) attack average.
Dmytro Teryomenko scored 10 points from the middle. Mitch Stahl, the American from UCLA, started at the other middle blocker position and put away 3 kills on 7 attempts with 1 error in the first 2 sets of action. His replacement, Barthelemy Chinenyeze, scored 9 points on 9 kills in 11 attempts in the last 2 sets of the match.
Irfan Hamzagic led the match with 26 points for Cannes. He finished with 2 aces, 1 block and 23 kills, though only hit .240 (46%). Martin Mechkarov was the only other double-digit scorer for Cannes with 11 points. He registered 10 kills, but hit .069 (34%). Cannes got 8 and 6 points respectively from their middle blockers, Danijel Koncilja and Jiri Kral.
Rennes Def. Nice 3-0 (25-18, 25-21, 25-22)
- Colette Besson Hall
- Attendance: 1800
- Rennes is 1-0 with 3 points; Nice slips to 0-1 with 0 points
Miguel Tavares ran an impressive offense for Rennes, setting his team to a .459 (59%) hitting percentage in a 3-0 sweep. Bram Van Den Dries was the front-runner with 19 points on 16 kills, 1 block and 2 aces. The starting opposite hit 57% (.429) in his 28 attempts. Gildas Prevert put away 5 kills from the middle on 6 attempts and no attack errors. He also contributed 3 blocks and 2 aces to finish with 10 points. Kamil Baranek hit .500 (56%) on his way to 10 kills. The outside hitter also contributed an ace.
Robin Overbeeke was the bright spot in an otherwise dismal performance from Nice. The starting opposite scored 20 points on 19 kills and a block. His 19 kills came on 23 swings for an attack average of 83% (.739). Adam Bartos was the match’s leading passer, and he also scored 8 points from the outside hitter position. Though his 7 kills came with 7 errors and he hit .000 for the night (35%).
Tourcoing Def. Toulouse 3-1 (25-17, 28-26, 24-26, 26-24)
- André Brouat Hall
- Attendance: 836
- Tourcoing is 1-0 with 3 points; Toulouse falls to 0-1 with 0 points
After an initial lopsided set win for Tourcoing, Toulouse gave them all they could handle in a series of sets decided only by 2 points each. The Ligue Nationale de Volley did not post the complete stat sheets for this match, and the live stats feed was not working properly. As a result, the attack statistics were not recorded properly. We will update this match summary as after the information becomes available.
Leave a Reply