From a Club Director & Coaches viewpoint this tour has been fabulous.  We have played four Youth National Teams, and one regional high performance team that feeds the German Youth National teams.

The matches against Germany & the Czechs were intense.  The Germans had the base for a strong team and they are in the first year of a two year cycle in developing it.  They have big strong athletic kids who can both attack and play defense.  Right now they are more developed in their attack, but as they play more their defense will become more formidable.   They run a variety of sets and do a good job of mixing it up.  At one point it appeared they were making a conscious effort to work on the right side attack.

The Czechs were more of an older Eastern Europe type program.  They relied heavily on their outside attackers to go up and pound the ball, and they had a couple of kids who could do that quite well.   We were able to beat them by committing most of our blocking and digging resources to the outside hitters.  Their middles were still young and not a major threat yet, but as they mature they will become more of a factor in the game.

The Bavarian High Performance Regional team played some awesome defense.  Unlike the Youth National team which they were a feeder program for, they had slightly less physical kids but they more than made up for that in defense.   They were very well coached  and really had a fun time playing.

The Slovenian team was definitely behind the others in development.  They lacked some of the bigger physical kids, but then they come from a country of only about 2 million people which is about the same size as Minneapolis/St Paul.    Considering that, they have done a great job developing players to this level. 

The Croatian Youth team was young and lacking the experience that their Jr National team had, but they were still very talented for basically a 15’s team.  They will be a good team in two years.

For our players, this has been a fabulous learning experience.  Every one of these teams has shown our players something new.  At this level of play each team is extremely aggressive, balls are always attacked from every position on the court.  It was good for the kids to see this and they in turn are becoming more aggressive in their style of play.   

This trip has been a once in a lifetime opportunity in terms of volleyball play.  Not too many kids from the USA get a chance to play these Federation teams, and then go have dinner with them!   We would like to thank Cory and the entire BringitUSA.com staff for a wonderful experience.