Dear all,

This is Matthew Hodgkinson, I’ll be coaching volleyball for the coming year. First thing I ought to tell you about is the weekly training schedule for the year. Trainings are :

• Mondays, 8 till 10pm, Main Hall (The times announced on Clubs & Socs day have changed.)
  Training of the Men and Women team for the Irish University League. There we want players with a minimum of experience in volleyball or good sportsmanship, and lots of dedication!
• Wednesdays, 7 till 8:30pm, Main Hall
  Social volleyball, open to all levels. Really, the focus is on beginners, but players of experience are always very welcome, as they are a great resource for a coach to help assist and motivate beginners in their learning.
• Fridays, 8 till 10pm, Small Hall
  Training of the Men team for the National League (to be distinguished from the University League). A volleyball squad, made of students and non-students, is already formed, and is having its first match of the season week-end after next. Additional players, men or women, are very welcome. They complete the numbers, and open possibilities to the coach (Konstantin, in this case, not me.) So if you’re really into sports and volleyball, just show, you’ll get a warm welcome. And if you’re a lad and want to join the team, we might have a job for you!

But as I don’t know your level yet, I would like to invite all members to join the session tomorrow (Monday). We’ll try and have as much fun as possible, but it will be the occasion for me to approach you, evaluate what you are expecting from our club and discuss which session(s) you ought to be assigned to. So remember : tomorrow, 8 till 10!

Now a little bit about us. I have been coaching NUIM Volleyball Club for the last three years, passed Coaching Levels 0 and 1 here in Ireland, with the Volleyball Association of Ireland (VAI). The name of NUIM is becoming renown in the growing circle of volleyball in Ireland. Last year, within the Irish University League, both our men and women teams traveled up to Belfast to compete in the finals, where our lads achieved a hard-fought silver, and our girls were celebrated All-Ireland Champions! The cup is sitting on my shelf right now

This year we can achieve even more and better results. For one thing, we are planning to enter the Intervarsities, held in Dublin College University (DCU), on the week-end of the 18th to the 20th of November. Also, the creation of a NUIM team for the National League I’m sure will be very beneficial to our students teams, as it will bring around players, trainings and matches of high standard.

The University League remains the most popular among students. In a qualifying stage, we are to play three or four matches, one against each team in our pool. Such matches may be held in Maynooth, Carlow, Galway, Cork… So there may be a bit of traveling involved The finals this year are to be held in Trinity College, Dublin, and they usually happen by the end of March / beginning of April.

All right, that’s all for now. I hope you all can make it tomorrow. Bring along sportswear and a smile, and it will be perfect

Matthew

Dear all,

Warmest congratulations to our men’s team, runners-up of the CUSAI volleyball league, and to our women’s team, 2009-2010 champions!

Those are well, well deserved rewards, the result of over five months of hard work. To top their qualifiers group and reach the semi-finals, the lads had to overcome Cork IT, IT Tallaght (ITT) and Galway-Mayo IT, the first two of which were especially tenacious. It was easier for the girls, who only had to play Galway-Mayo IT, who by no means were a match for them.

The semi-finals and finals were played in University of Ulster Jordanstown, Belfast, on Friday the 19th of March 2010 (yesterday). The lads met Trinity College Dublin in their semis, and won by two sets to one (NUIM 22-25 25-15 15-10 TCD) in an exciting match! On the girls side, we braced ourselves to confront IT Carlow,  very promising on the paper (top of their own group, winners to TCD by 3-0 and to UCD, former champions, by 2-1), and yet it came to be a clear, unambiguous victory of ours (NUIM 25-12 25-6 ITC).

The finals opposed NUIM to DCU on the men’s side, and NUIM to TCD on the women’s. Our lads could not overcome a very, very strong DCU side, whose superiority was indisputable (NUIM 10-25, 15-25 DCU). As for the girls, they found a real opponent in Trinity : that team had a great choice of players (6 on court, 4 on the substitutes’ bench!), advanced tactics (from one set to another freely shifting from a 6-2 to a 5-1) and fluid attacking combinations. They had the potential of stealing one set away from us, and although they came close to that result in the first set, it never happened : NUIM won by two sets to none, 25-23, 25-18.

So the outcome of the year is silver, for the lads, and gold, for the girls. The cup is home, and will remain there until next year. The direct contributors to those achievements were :

• Guilhem Gastal
• Keiv Reynolds (setter)
• Stephen Guyard
• Chidi Ubadike
• Mina Kelada
• Christian Henriques (captain)
• Bjorn Larsen
• Patrick Howard
• Brendan Smith
• Lincoln Wesley
• Joshua Galecki
• Jean-Jacques Le Roy
• Matthieu Hodgkinson (coach)

• Sara Hoolan
• Meegan Montgomery
• Anna Shemyakova
• Jessica O’Leary (captain)
• Meghan Grow
• Richelle O’Leary
• Laura Pulz
• Katie Burant
• Stephanie Moon
• Matthieu Hodgkinson (coach)

Thursday-participants, you also contributed to this success : you make the sessions enjoyable, you bring players along who reveal themselves as real assets in the CUSAI teams (e.g. through Adam, in the second semester, came Stephanie), and you might yourselves grow into players who have the potential to joining those teams. So thank you, and keep it up!

Finally, I would like to acknowledge the support we received from the staff of the Sports Complex, in particular Pamela Lucas and Paul Davis, as well as the efforts of the Student’s Union to provide the club with the funding that’s necessary to its working.

Our major competition is now over, but there still is until the end of April to go with trainings, friendlies and a couple of one-day tournaments. Trainings will therefore keep running as usual until the hall closes for the exams.

Again very, very well done to both our teams, we’re all very proud.

Matthieu

Dear all,

During study week there will only be training on Tuesday, for the competitors in the CUSAI League. There won’t be training on Thursday, because the CUSAI teams go to Belfast for the finals the day after and I want them to rest, and because I’m afraid there would not be enough beginners alone, considering it’s study week.

Enjoy this break

Matthew

Bjorn took some great picks on that occasion, which can be viewed here.

I find the group picture excellent. It’s a pity Bjorn had to hold the camera, but we’re all having a grateful thought. Thank you Bjorn

See you next week,

Matthew

Dear all,

Dear all,

Clubs and societies resume their activities this very week. This mean that volleyball is back on too, Tuesdays (small hall) and Thursdays (large hall), 8 till 10, still. Both sessions are for beginners and experienced together, at least for now – how the trainings will be organised for the coming semester is not defined yet.

Hoping to see many familiar faces,

Matthew

Dear all,

The sports halls are closed from Wednesday until early February for the exams. So training is on on Tuesday, but off on Thursday. We’ll let you know when they resume.

Happy Christmas to you all, and best of luck with your January exams!

Matthew

And there we go again!!

Congrats to our lads who, yesterday, beat Institute of Technology Tallaght on their grounds, per two sets to one, 25-21, 23-25, 25-22 (or something like that). It was a tough, nerve-wrecking match. ITT had a few decent setters and attackers, and most of all, a bril-liant captain, with unreal attacking skills. And yet… oh well, we were just better. They deserved to win a set, though, they really did.

We also got pom-pom girl support in the persons of Manuela, Victoire and Irena. We love when girls are watching us and cheering up for us, so thank you girls Plus, they took photos! With a bit of luck, they’ll share them with us

The two other pool teams to play are Galway-Mayo IT (Galway), and Athlone IT. Those matches were originally scheduled in February, but so as to give Lincoln and Josh an opportunity of playing another match before they leave, I’m trying to make that happen in December instead.

So far we’re top of our pool. If we keep up the good work and performances, we should finish on top too. Then we’d play the semi-finals against the second of the group Trinity College, IT Carlow, Dundalk IT, and Dublin City University. So far IT Carlow has the lead, with a 3-0 victory against Trinity. ITC were okay two years ago, and Trinity very strong, so I don’t know what’s happened in the meantime.

The website to check to keep posted on that sort of details is cusai.ie. For Volleyball League standings, check http://www.cusai.ie/event.php?event_id=487&action=standings&div=961&sport=Volleyball.

Right, that was excellent craic. Thank you guys for being so assiduous and striving to improve, I’m really having a good time with you, and am looking forward to next session next Tuesday.

N-U-I… Maynooth!!!

Matthew