Side Walk Sale

Each year there is a Jule (Christmas) Sidewalk sale with little shops set up for over a kilometer.
This year there were about 15,000 people in attendance, not bad for a city with 14,000 people

One of the pub/restaurants decorated with lights

George playing with Jacobs kids! Very cute kids i must say

Brage and I having a Jule ol (Christmas Beer) on a patio

A few pictures from our First Tourni

This is the tourni we came third even with 5 players.Astrid, Marie, Marie, Ag, Line, Henriette

Back to .500 with win over Skobakken

Friday November 28th we played Skobakken in Arhus. They were in last place with a record of 0-7 which can be a dangerous situation going into their gym. I commented earlier that they were a young team, however this time around they had picked up a new older setter which made them much more stable. They also play pretty impressive defense. Balls just seem to bounce up off of them. We got out to a 5-0 lead in the first set and played somewhat consistent ball. After 4 or 5 questionable referee calls (keep in mind with rally point that is an 8-10 point swing) we found ourselves locked at 24. They ended up blocking me (my only offensive error on the night) at 24-25 and won the set. We rebounded and took the next three sets and won the match 3-1. Some things to note about the match. You have to bring your A game to every match. We beat the number 1 team last week and were pushed by the last place team this week. Another thing is getting used to the refereeing.. If you're reading this in Canada, wow you have it sooo well. Instead of focusing on making the in or out or touch calls, most of the referees are trying to make zaney calls. For example, in the 4th set at 22-21 for us, they went back to serve and it was quite noisy in the gym. The server did not hear the whistle and looked at the referee for confirmation. The ref stood there and you could feel him counting, almost hoping he wouldn't serve in time so that he could make that call. After the 8 second call, a player kicked the ball and the ref gave him a yellow card (and a point) making the score 24-21 and in essence ending the game. It wasn't really how the game should have ended but 2points is 2points in a tight playoff race. Next we play Aalborg on Thursday, a team that dominated us the first time around. But boy are we feeling ready this time!

another article

From Melfar Posten
translated by Gramtrans.com

Victory over the masters

Safe victory to Middelfart at home over Marienlyst

Af Tommy Beck

Volleyball: After having lost to the four teams in front in Volleyball the league and thus for the first time in fairly many years being outside that top-four placement which gives access to the semifinal game about the Danish championship, so that we Friday evening a fairly convincing and lit Middelfart-team that put the masters from Marienlyst in that degree on place with a safe 3-1 victory in Lillebæltshallen.

There is hardly doubt that Marienlyst had gone to the west-Funen in the safe belief that the fight would become a "fairly normal day against Middelfart at the office". Completely different was the local team put up, and first during third set they put a little championship game over Marienlyst. The figures in the fight stayed: 25-21, 25-22, 19-25 and 25-21.

At the day depended the visitors' games very much with the star Shaun Powell's games. At the first two sets he arranged far too many mistakes. At third set he was strong with his great jump force, but at fourth and last set he failed again far too much, and it surprisingly but rather safe victory for the hosts was a fact.

At first sets the two teams we went to 9-9, but with four balls i-pulls together got the home team the lead which helped to secure the set.

The visitors didn't come closer on than 17-16 and 19-18, and typical of the set scored the home team its 25. point at a serve mistake by the visitors.

At other set an especially the home team's server and blockades were completely on the top. With big safety the visitors' Michael Søes and Shaun Powell were blocked. At other set the visitors led only at the position 4-5. The teams we went together to 13-13 in the middle of the set, where the home team again took decisive to 17-13. The densest, the visitors put into the final phase, was at the position 23-21, before the home team again moved off with making sure the two next point.

Third set started again very just, but from 10-9 to the home team Marienlyst went to 10-12 and the rest of the set there stood Marienlyst on. At this point came the thoughts, whether the home team would go the distance, but during fourth set there wasn't more doubt about the home team's strength at the day.

The visitors' last lead at fourth set was at 3-4. From 9-9 the home team went to 14-10 and 16-11. Here was the fight really decided. Later it stayed 20-13, but closer on than 23-19 didn't put Marienlyst.

With the victory Middelfart played oneself back i top-four, and with the game last Friday proved the team that they also belong to there. The art is forward-oriented to manage to raise the bottom-level up to what they achieved against the masters.

On the winning team Matt Lebourdai's were strongly the game joints, but also Scott Townsend, Parrish Offer, Søren Brunke and Ulrik Degn beautifully showed games.

The team's next struggle is at Friday in Århus against the bottom team Skovbakken, before HIK Ålborg will come to the town on Thursday December 4th at 19.45. Especially the last fight will be decisive for Middelfart's prospects in the top of the row.

Victory tastes Sweet!

Recently we've been struggling a little bit with consistency. We are a very good team, but often during games we have a period for about 5 points where we seem to either forget how to pass, serve or attack the ball. We've been training very hard the last couple of weeks to overcome this. Last week, we lost a thrilling 5 setter to Holte (a team we were tied with in the standings) and again during the match we lost strings of points.
This Friday we played Marienlyst who was 6-0 coming into the match and hadn't lost to a Danish team in about 20 games stemming from last year. They had beaten everyone (including us, 3-1) the first time. Our hard work paid off early as both teams traded points. A few late errors on their part and we won the first set 25-21. More consistent play through the second set gave us the set 25-22, We faulted a little bit in the 3rd and lost 25-19 but rebounded in the 4th to win the set and match 25-21.
Personally, i was pretty quiet in the first two sets. I concentrated on my passing and defence. In the 3rd and 4th set they switched their setters and Scott gave me alot of opportunities to attack over top of him. It was fun! lol

Beating the number 1 team is really good for our confidence but it didn't seem like we were playing THAT much better. I think it's because we often had times in previous match when we were playing as well as we did last night. It's because we cut out those 3-5 points each set that made the difference. It also felt like a boxing match. As DP used to say, just keep jabbing at the other team, you're gonna take your hits but see who is standing at the end. Well fought match and hopefully we keep moving forward.

Stats
8 Kills, 2 Errors, 16 Times Attacking, 1 Ace

Article in the newspaper

http://www.melfarposten.dk/article/1123465:Melfar-Posten--Volleyspillere-hos-optikeren

Translated by Gram trans


Not a word about lack of ball eye - only one gentleman from MVK's picked team needed new glasses Middelfart:

No - that wasn't thought as a comment for their performances at the track or lack of ball eye.

But the gentleman's-picked players from Middelfart Volleyballklub were all consequently invited for a check with optician Benno Jeppesen in Algade the other day.

The visit probably was an element in the sponsor cooperation, and all the players on the gentleman's-picked team managed to test their visions, and sight motor function.

Then the players know this front, if the results at the track fail.

At the tests that were arranged the team lay in the scoring very high, and they were divorced generally very positively out.

Only one player needed new glasses.

Benno Jeppesen is by the way the only optician in Middelfart, who is trained for to arrange this test of the sight motor function.

J day

Each year the first Friday in November is called J Day here. It is the first day that stores and bars can sell Christmas beer. They can begin selling at 8:59pm so at some places there is even a countdown like new years! Christmas beer is a little sweeter and a bit stronger- usually about 6.5%. We all went to Cafe Razz and had one to test it out. Pretty cool holiday if you ask me! And they give out free hats!

Brage, Mizuno, Mrs. Mizuno, George

George, Me, Brage
George and Brage.. with me in the background!



George, who doesn't drink!
My newest hat!

Match vs Ikast

On Saturday, November 8th we traveled to Ikast to play. They are a new team that moved up from First Division last year. It was a good chance to get on track and put a win on the board in our own league. We had a pretty intense week of training with lots of jumping and were going into the weekend with a lot of confidence. We got to the gym and there was a girls match before us. It kinda felt like a university game as the match obviously went five sets!

We started off our match a little bit slow and it was tight until about 10's. After that we went on a bit of a serving tear and won the first set 25-21. They struggled a lot with our serving and we won the next two sets 25-15, 25-17. It was an important win that we needed to take care of.
Here is a news video of the match:
http://www.tv2regionerne.dk/reg2005/player.aspx?id=453045&r=6

Norway

On Thursday October 30th, we left for Norway to play in the Nordic Cup Championship. There are 2 pools of 4 teams and then our pool which only had 3 teams in it.
To qualify for the finals in Finland you needed to win your pool plus there was one wild card spot for the second place team with the best record. We first got on a train in Middelfart and went to the Copenhagen airport.
We flew from Copenhagen to Bergen, Norway, which was a beautiful flight. Coming into Bergen all you could see was water and mountains. Next we rented cars and drove for about 3 hours to Fjorde.
It is much different then Denmark which is very flat. I almost got sick the roads were so windy and moutainous. About two hours into the drive we had to take a half hour ferry ride to go another island
After the 12 hour travel day of trains, planes, automobiles and even boats, we finally arrived at our hotel. The first thing you notice about Fjorde is that it is completely surrounded by mountains, much like Banff. The sun never directly hit the ground in the city while we were there. It was a very self contained city. Impressive to say the least. We were greated with dinner at the hotel restaurant. A succulent seafood buffet, that we soon realized would be home to all our meals.

I really started getting used to 3 all you can eat meals a day and even weighing in when i got home i was up about 6 pounds!

After our meal we checked out the facilities and watched the team we would be playing practice a little bit. They looked pretty good!
We had a good night sleep and practice and it was game time. We played the home team Fjorde in the first match. An hour before the match people started showing up with pots, pans and drums. The feeling in the gym was electric, if thought there were maybe 100 people in the stands. Fjorde's starting setter was injured so they had their backup in and their offense was pretty slow. We capitalized on lotsa blocking opportunities and won 3-0 quite handly.

The next day we play played Nyborg. They had beaten Fjorde 3-0 the week before so we knew that it would be a much tighter match. I personally started off the match on fire. I had 8 kills on my first 8 attempts. We won the first set 32-30 in quite the battle. Nyborg rebounded and won the next two sets 25-22 and 25-23, the fourth set with our backs against the wall we took 25-23 which lead us to the 5th set. Feeling fired up we came out ready to take the match, unfortunatly we didn't get off to a great start...or really finish! We struggled early with passing and then Nyborg was relentless in their defence. We lost the 5th set 15-6 in a disapointing way.
However since we lost extremely close we were waiting to see if we qualified in the wild card spot. It wasn't until we reached home the next day that we heard that we had qualified so we now head to Finland in January to compete in the finals.