5 Reacting to Japan vs. Brazil Volleyball 2022 Women's FIVB World Championships

What's up, everyone? Welcome back. And if you are new here, welcome to my channel, where we talk about all things volleyball. All right, you guys, quick update from here in Poland. We have had three matches since my last video. The first was away in Zawiercze, where we unfortunately lost three sets to one. But then we came back home in Zaxe, and we played against Bielsko-Biała, and we won 3-0. Great win for us there. And then last night, we played away in Stalnice, and unfortunately, we lost 3-0. They played amazing. Not our best game, but we are currently sitting at 3-2 in the Polish Blues League. Okay, you guys, so for today's video, we're gonna be switching it up just a little bit. I know I was watching a lot of men's VNL volleyball from this last summer, but I had to just change it up a little bit to watch some of the women's FIVB World Championships from this last month. In particular, this match, Japan versus Brazil World Championship Quarterfinal, fifth set. I was watching this match live on TV, just going absolutely insane at the kinds of plays that were happening. I gotta take another look at this fifth set. Let's watch this one together. Fifth set, Japan, Brazil. Let's do this. Okay, fifth set, Brazil versus Japan. Brazil serving here. This was, I just can't wait to watch this. Float serve, got Japan out of system. Nice up, go. Wow, so you don't see Japan women's volleyball or men's volleyball out of system that much, especially on that first serve, float serve. I mean, it was probably a tough serve, but normally Japan just nails those balls. Got him out of system, but took a high hand shot. Got the point. Of course my dishwasher is making noise right now. Serve, backs, ooh, look at that slide. Look at the speed of this offense, boom. That is, there's no chance for a double block there. No chance. Brazil gets the point. Brazil serving, one, one. Are they gonna serve at the libero again? Okay, so maybe they're planned to serve at the libero. Look at that speed. I love the creativity that Japan plays with. You can see, she didn't have the best swing there, so she just tipped it really strong into the block, into the middle of the players. That's Gabby and Carol blocking, two of the best blockers players in the world. Had to change it up a little bit. Got the kill with just a smart tip. Lots of ways to kill a volleyball. Number five serving. Gabby, nice pass. Ooh, nice play. So you can see Carol here ran a slide. She's going back. And then their D ball hitter moves inside, hits the ball off the block. High hands, perfect point there. Two, two. Going at the libero. Dang. The speed of that ball. Oh, look, Brazil was there. So the outside hitter here has an overpass, but she doesn't put the most heat on the ball, but just enough for the Brazil player to react. The other player was right there. Okay, three to two. Gabby sailed long. So she tried to hit high hands here. Double block up there. She was a little bit wide. Missed the hands by just a little bit. 15 serving again, four to two. Woo, nasty float. Nice pass. And Carol. Carol, Carol, Carol. Look how quickly she gets up. Boom. Ridiculous play. Gabby serving here. Three serving four. Serving it at the outside. Nail. Speed. And sneaks it through the block. So one thing in this match, Brazil definitely has a height advantage over Japan. So Japan has to go super quick here for the slide, but you can see Carol just gets up there, gets a great touch, and then the opposite here, sneaks it through the block. Brazil has that height advantage. Japan maybe has the speed advantage, but we'll see how it works out in the end. Four, four. Gabby. Little bit of a misconnect. And she, what? They thought she got the kill. First of all, look at that defense. So the one thing about going super fast on offense is that sometimes you can have a misconnect. You can see here with the pipe. They tried to go so fast that they misconnect. Luckily, Japan always makes up for it with defense like that. And then they get the kill. I think Brazil celebrated just a little bit too early. Five serving four. Going at the outside. High ball. Double block. Nice up by the libero. Nice play there. Control it. Perfect touch. Nice speed, but Brazil's defense is there too. And then high off the hands. So you can see, this is just a defensive battle. First of all, look at this up by the libero, just sprawling out. Look at that range. That's insane range for a player of that size. That is so awesome. And then you can see Carroll making a play there. This, a perfect touch. And then right here, you can see the defense for Brazil fills in the hole. Gets the up. High ball outside. High off the hands. So anytime you can go high off the hands on Japan, it's great. They're not necessarily the biggest block and the defense plays around the block. So if you can use their hands, it's definitely to your advantage. High ball. Look at that angle. That was such a nice angle. Great touch. High ball. 22 just reads it. Defense. Look at 22 there. Unfortunately, Japan net. But are you kidding? Let's watch this libero get this tip. First of all, she's number 22, just like me. So right here, you can see the opposite kind of reach for it. The ball was a little bit inside. So she starts moving up to get that ball, get that tip. Anytime you see a hitter kind of move their arm up here, have it extended like here, they're probably going to tip, roll shot, throw it. So you can make your way forward and try to be balanced moving forward to that ball. Six, five, Japan. Oh, Brazil must've net. My fault. That is some speed too, but you can see Japan has two blockers there. They're just not the tallest blockers. So the middle blocker for Brazil is able to go over them into the part of the court that the defenders are not. Six all. Okay, that is such a steady pass. Oh, just a little bit over, but pretty good pass. They're just a little bit tight for Japan's offense, but great serve. You can see how much that was floating. Seven, six. So they are targeting this libero. Woo! Nice up. Did you see that rip by Ishikawa? And then she changes it. She tips. Whoa. And that was an inside hit. So as much as we talk about Japan's defense, I mean, look at Brazil's here. Ishikawa just takes a rip cross court. Their defender digs it on the three meter line and then this up, and then eventually just crushes it cross court. What a point. Okay, so at the switch, Brazil is up eight to six. That was just an insane defensive point there by Brazil and Japan, but Brazil converted it with that sharp spike. They're up eight to six now, which is a pretty nice advantage to have in the fifth set. Going at the libero. Good touch by Brazil. That's definitely their advantage. Nice defense. Go. Pipe. Ah, misconnect. How is she getting all these balls? Go. Just not connecting here for Japan on offense. There we go. They have a chance here and they get the point. That was all defense. All effort, all out, just going crazy on defense. And finally they got that touch right at the end there. You could see that the touches just weren't great. The setting was all over. They just couldn't get that swing a little bit. Also for Brazil, they just couldn't get that transition. And then here, they finally got a perfect touch, run the speed of their offense, and she goes high hands down the line. So great defense there. Not always the best touches, which are two different things in my opinion. If you have the chance to make a ball perfect, or you can put it high on a three meter line, two meter line, then you have to do it. In this case, they're all out sprawling, all out effort. And it's hard to make that ball perfect, which for Japan is not necessarily their advantage. They always like to be in system. So for them to get that final touch and then that high hands hit, that was great. All right, 8-7 now, 22. I just, I'm obsessed with her. Another kill. Look at this libero. She recognizes the tip early, right about there. She can see that she's not gonna hit it. And she starts moving forward as soon as she can to get that up. And then Ishikawa goes wrist. How does she go away like that? Like her whole body's facing the camera like this, and then her arm is going like that. I just don't understand. Okay, 8-8 after my coughing attack, I apologize. Japan serving, going short. Fast out to the slide. What? Oh, they called it down. I thought they got that ball up and I was about to go nuts. I did go nuts. What? 9-8 Brazil. Nice serve, great angle to Gabby. Look at this setter playing defense. She sees that ball's a little bit outside and she moves into the court. Gabby again. Again! How? Two times she gets this dig. Look, she sees the ball's a little bit outside and she knows that Gabby loves this kind of hit. So she moves in and just gets the ball. I don't understand how she made that read. Just so good. All right, 9-9. Nice pass. There we go, Gabby, classic. So she knew that the last time Japan got good touches on her because she kind of went right into the hands. This time, Gabby switches it up and goes directly off the right hand of Japan. That is such a smart hit. And you can see, Brazil runs also a pretty fast offense. People don't always think that maybe they don't run it as quick as Japan, but that was a pretty quick set. And with Gabby's height and her jump, she can just basically hit wherever she wants. 10-9. Wow, that is such... Look at the speed of that set. That is like a 20-foot back set. And then they use the high hands. I mean, pretty impressive, pretty impressive. Serving sub in, 10-10. Ooh, libero being aggressive, yes. Another great high hand shot. So what I love about this play is you can see the libero right there just goes in super aggressive. She knows that the setter's just gonna bump set it, so she might as well just go in, put a little bit of pace on the set with her hands, allow Gabby to go high hands, which she does. That's a great play by Brazil. And in general, Brazil's gonna have the advantage over Japan when it comes to high ball offense or offense that's a little bit off the net, just because they're a little bit taller and they might have just a little bit more power. So Brazil has the advantage when it comes to that. Nice serve. Look at that angle. I'm sorry, I'm just stopping. Look at this. Look at the shoulders. Passers, that, that. Mental note, that. Just shoulders over, angle, like right shoulder down, footwork solid, core solid. Ah! Quick back set, misconnect. See, that's the hard part about a quick offense. I am. So Gabby just does a beautiful high hand shot. Look at this setter. And then they get a swing and they miss the block by a little bit. That defense. I remember I screamed at the TV when I watched that one. Yep. But Brazil, you know, when you're a team like Brazil playing against defense like that, when Japan's just scrambling, it can be so frustrating. And I'm pretty sure that they are just breathing a sigh of relief that they missed the high hands there. 12-10. Out of system, bump set, high ball. Ooh, Carroll, Carroll. Pretty sure there's like a viral clip of the Serbian coach saying not into Carroll, don't hit into Carroll. And this is why. Look at that. Boom. So the one thing I haven't really talked about is Brazil's serving. They are doing a great job of getting Japan out of system. You can see Japan can't run their quick, gnarly, nasty offense that they normally run because Brazil's serving is so effective. They're putting in different spots, changing up who they're serving, and just doing a great job of getting them off the net so they have a better chance to block the ball, just like that one. 13-10. Setter serving again. Going down the line. Beautiful, just beautiful angle. And a smart play there. Can we just watch this pass? Look at that. Shuffle step, arms are out, shoulders are over, space between her platform and her body. Great angle, and then quick back. Little bit of a misconnect, but again, smart play. Tip into the block, make them get over the net. If you can hit the left side of Carroll there, the middle blocker, it's gonna be a point on the tip like that. Watch, hits the left hand, boom. 11-13. Nice serve. Great pass, look at that. Look up. So this is one thing I love to talk about passing with passers. Did I say that right? Is that you can be moving backwards like this. You can have your weight back, but your shoulders can still be forward, and that's how the ball gets to the net. She does a great job of just keeping her shoulders forward, her platform solid and away from her body. So even though she's falling backwards here, she gets that ball to the net. Great job. Woo, sneaks it down the line also. This opposite is doing a great job this set. I believe that's four or five points. And I know she's not talked about all that much in the world of volleyball, because I do think she's a newer player, but in this set, she's sneaky. She's killing it. All right, match point for Brazil. 14-11, Gabby serving. Good touch, nice cover. Gabby, look at this, just rotating into perfect defense. Ooh, so the set got a little bit inside here. I think she was a little rushed, didn't quite get her feet there, and then hit it down the line. She was trying to go for the high hands. But overall, I love that defensive play by Gabby there. You could see that if a Japanese hitter is gonna go against the opposite or Carol, she probably wants to hit against the opposite if she can't get it inside. So you can see Gabby here rotates over to the right to defend around the smaller blocker, and she just gets that up. Unfortunately, there's a little bit of a misconnect here. She hits it out, gives Japan the point. 12-14, match point number two. You can see the fans are up. Nice pass, woo! Love this play. So after this dig, Ishikawa on the left here doesn't quite get the best swing. You can see she's about 12 feet off the net, four meters, that is not 12 feet, whatever. But she puts it on the setter here. Number nine, the setter has to take the first ball, which means someone else that is not the setter, the libero in this case, has to take the ball, which means they're not gonna run quite the offense if the setter were running. So that's such a smart play by Ishikawa to make Brazil work just a little bit harder. Libero set, high ball, nice set. The monster block. So Japan just making, look at this dig, just getting blown up, but using her body to get that ball up, hips thrust up. Smart play here, high ball, Japan gets their block up. Boom. Look at Japan's defense, all around the block. Nobody even is inside the block. All the players are playing around the block, and then area six is playing over the block. Perfect positioning, gets the monster block. Okay, 13-14, match point number three for Brazil. They played so great this set. Their serving in particular, I think, has been the difference. Pipe to Gabby, dig, joust, puts it over. Back no one, nice up. You just don't hit to 22, don't hit to number 22. No, I didn't know it ended. I thought there was another point or something. But just look at Japan's defense here. They gave everything they could, and Brazil just came back with harder and harder spikes. They played so good as well. Look that up, this joust. Ooh, maybe if she could have controlled that ball, but that's hard. And then 22, playing outside the block. Great defense. Ishikawa just tries to go sharp cross, avoiding Carroll, and misses it cross. And Brazil ends up winning the fifth set, 15-13. They played so good to advance to the semifinals of the World Championships. Congrats to them. All right, you guys, what a game, what a set, what a match. My mind is basically blown. But once again, congrats to Brazil for advancing to the World Championship semifinal with that 3-2 win over Japan. Obviously, I talked a lot about Japan's defense. Enough said with them, they're just insane. But the one big difference, I think, that was made in that set was Brazil's serving. And it's something that I didn't really notice watching it live. They put so much pressure on Japan by changing up their zones, serving down the line, serving cross court, and they just got Japan off the net just enough for their block to get in great positions, to get great touches, blocks, and for their defense to play around it. So I thought Brazil played so well. They had a great strategy with that serving and with their blocking and put just enough balls to the floor to get that match. So again, congrats to Brazil. What a game. But anyway, guys, I hope you enjoyed that video. I hope you learned a little bit. I know that I did. For our next video, back to the VNL, maybe another USA match, and then on to the world champs and more women's world champs as well. And then probably on to the club professional season. So stick around, stay with me, here to watch more volleyball with you all. But as usual, get out, play some volleyball if you can, have some fun, and I'll see you all soon. Peace.