Seychelles Volleyball Federation (SVF) Shield-Beau Vallon end Premium Spikers' hat-trick dream |11 April 2005

AFTER easily winning the first set 25-11 in 25 minutes, Premium Spikers must have thought that they could match Beau Vallon’s record of three consecutive wins in the Seychelles Volleyball Federation (SVF) Shield, but it wasn’t to be.

To achieve a hat-trick, especially when playing against Beau Vallon, a team have to be very well prepared mentally, physically and tactically. But Premium Spikers clearly lacked all of these three qualities on Saturday at the Palais des Sports as they faltered 1-3 (25-11 23-25 23-25 21-25) in under 90 minutes of play.

Saturday’s match was not of a very high level as both teams struggled to break the rust off their game following a four-month break.

With just one week’s training, Beau Vallon, playing way below their best form which they displayed during last December’s Indian Ocean Club Championship (IOCC) which Seychelles hosted and they won, reclaimed the SVF Shield to break Premium Spikers’ two-year stranglehold.

Coach Bernard Denis’ Premium Spikers had made Beau Vallon relinquish the SVF Shield in 2003, stopping them from achieving a fourth consecutive title. And last year, they prised open Beau Vallon’s rock-solid block to deal them a big blow with a 3-0 win in just 48 minutes.

Saturday’s win brings to four the number of SVF Shield victories for Beau Vallon in six years, the other three coming in 2000, 2001 and 2002.

After the season-opening Curtain-raiser competition was scrapped from this year’s calendar of events as the new SVF executive committee argued of limited time, lack of venue and not enough money, play in Saturday’s SVF Shield was always going to be untidy and was even scrappy at times.

The players seemed to play in slow motion and they committed many mistakes, probably due to no prior competition to get them to warm up for the match played between the League and SVF Cup champions of the previous season.

Not even coaches Bernard Denis (Premium Spikers) and Antoine Panagary (Beau Vallon) could talk their players into the right playing rhythm. But of the two teams, Beau Vallon took the initiative to win after Premium Spikers had ran out of ideas.

It is to note that Beau Vallon are the title holders of both major cups – League championship and SVF Cup – and runners-up Premium Spikers filled the void to play the SVF Shield.

Saturday’s win was the fourth in a row for Beau Vallon over Premium Spikers and the sequence started in the second round match of last year’s League championship. It followed with victory in the SVF Cup final and the IOCC semifinal. All three victories came on 3-0 scores.

Beau Vallon team captain Guilly Bijoux, whose team only got a training venue a week before the match, explained to Sports Nation after Saturday’s victory that “we have used this game to measure our progress.”

“We have to train harder. This is not the kind of volleyball we want to play and are capable of playing. We can do much better than that,” said Bijoux.

Without main spiker Jean-Paul Ah-kong (knee injry) coupled with the retirement of François Ally and the departure of libero Perrin Sophola for Racing Club, coach Denis knows that Premium Spikers have to up their game to be able to rival with Beau Vallon and possibly Racing Club in the hunt for titles this year.

After Beau Vallon’s win, it remains to be seen if Cascade can also return as women’s SVF Shield winners on Saturday April 16 when they play Arsu who returned on Sunday after participating in the 20th African Club Championship in Nairobi, Kenya.

Like Beau Vallon, Cascade had won three consecutive SVF Shield titles in 2000, 2001 and 2002 before Arsu won the last two in 2003 and 2004.

G. G.