London 2012 Olympic champion Dmitriy Muserskiy was one of the key players in the Japanese V. League this weekend as his team Suntory Sunbirds won a pair of matches to take the top spot in the national tournament.
Muserskiy propels Sunbirds to V. League’s first place
The Russian Olympic champion helped his team win a pair of matches over the weekend
Published 11:05, 30 Jan 2022
The Sunbirds faced the JT Thunder Hiroshima on Saturday and Sunday and the matches played out entirely differently as the winners needed all five sets (23-25, 26-24, 15-25, 26-24, 15-11) to win the first encounter, but were able to take the second in just three (27-25, 25-15, 25-21).
The Most Valuable Player of the 2020-2021 edition of the V. League, the 33-year-old, 2.18m Muserskiy was the Sunbirds’ top scorer in both meetings, tallying 26 points (23 kills, three blocks) in the first match and 17 (14 kills, two aces, one block) in the second.
With the two victories, the eight-time and defending champions now sit at the top of the standings with 17 wins and five losses. The team benefited from an unexpected loss for the Osaka Sakai Blazers, who entered the week in the lead.
The Blazers built from a 23-point (21 kills, two aces) performance from opposite Sharone Vernon-Evans to take the Toray Arrows down in three sets on Saturday, but fell in five sets to the same opponent on Sunday despite 33 points (27 kills, five blocks, one ace) produced by the Canadian. Hungarian opposite Krisztian Padar led the Arrows with 17 points (16 kills, one block) in the first meeting and 28 (27 kills, one block) in the second. Both teams are tied for second in the league, with 16 points.
In terms of individual performances, no one came close to Bartosz Kurek. The Polish world champion saw his team Wolfdogs Nagoya drop a five-setter to Oita Miyoshi Weisse Adler on Saturday despite his 40 points (38 kills, two blocks) but came back to produce a match-high 24 (19 kills, three blocks, two aces) on Sunday’s straight-set victory.
His fellow Polish national team member Michal Kubiak, on the other hand, was able to celebrate a pair of wins with his team Panasonic Panthers over the VC Nagano Tridents during the weekend. The Polish captain delivered 22 points (20 kills, two blocks) on Saturday and added another 11 (ten kills, one ace) in Sunday’s four-set meeting. Tridents’ Indonesian opposite Rivan Nurmulki was the top scorer in both matches with 26 (25 kills, one block) and 22 (21 kills, one block) points respectively.
The meetings between JTEKT Stings and FC Tokyo were the least eventful of the weekend, with the team from Kariya taking both matches in three sets. Japanese national team opposite Kento Miyaura tallied 19 (15 kills, three aces, one block) and 17 points (11 kills, five aces, one block) in the meetings.
The Japanese V. League continues next weekend with ten more meetings scheduled between Saturday and Sunday.
