In last year's Women's Volleyball World League, the Chinese women's volleyball team defeated many strong opponents and finally won the runner-up. This result is the best ranking of the Chinese women's volleyball team in the previous World League, and Li Yingying, Yuan Xinyue, and Diao Linyu in the team also won the titles of the best main attack, the best secondary attack and the best setter in the tournament respectively. At that time, the Chinese women's volleyball team seemed to be standing at the peak of the world women's volleyball team again.
However, after returning to the domestic league, the performance of some national players has been very different from the world league, among which the situation of setter Diao Linyu is the most prominent. Diao Linyu's data in the Jiangsu women's volleyball team is very poor, and among all setters in domestic clubs, Diao Linyu's ranking is actually outside the 15th. This can't help but make people ask: From the best setter of the world women's volleyball team to being unknown in the domestic league list, what is wrong with Diao Linyu?
The root cause of this problem is investigated by the following factors:
First of all, the situation of the national team is different from that of the Jiangsu team. The national team is a top-level player selected by the country, and the offense in the team, whether it is the main attack Li Yingying and Wang Yunrui, or Gong Xiangyu, or the secondary attack Wang Yuanyuan and Yuan Xinyue, they have a strong ability to adjust the offense, even if Diao Linyu's passing is flawed, the attack of the Chinese women's volleyball team will still have a certain lethality, and teammates and Diao Linyu can better complement each other. But in the Jiangsu team, the situation has changed, Diao Linyu's teammates are relatively young, and Diao Linyu's passing is needed to better make up for the shortcomings of his teammates on the field. Once Diao Linyu's pass is not in place, he will face a lack of offensive power, so in the Jiangsu women's volleyball team, Diao Linyu's play is largely restricted.
Second, the World League and the domestic league have different bases for the ranking of setters. The FIVB and the Chinese Volleyball Association have a big difference in their respective bases in the data ranking of setters, and the FIVB is based on the number of passes and half-blocks that are shaken out of space, one-on-one and one-on-one, but the quality of the pass is not considered. The Chinese Volleyball Association is mainly based on the number of passes to form an effective offense. Diao Linyu's passing, often pursuing speed without too much consideration of whether the offensive players are in place, so there are more empty balls passed, but there are relatively few passes that form an effective attack. Therefore, Diao Linyu's ranking in the international arena is good, but in the domestic arena, he will lose his name to Sun Shan.
Third, Diao Linyu's technical characteristics are clear passing ideas, accurate judgment of the landing point of the ball, strong explosiveness, and excellent blocking ability. Her reflexes, power and speed are top-notch, and she has no shortage of brilliance in the game. But under the influence of Cai Bin's light-speed playing concept of the national team, no matter whether the pass is in place or not in place, Diao Linyu has to rush to "throw" the ball out. On the one hand, this affects the quality of the pass, and on the other hand, it is not easy for the offensive players to hit the ball. So sometimes Diao Linyu's passing caused the offensive efficiency is not high.
So, can Diao Linyu still become the main player in the preparation for the World League related to Olympic qualification and the subsequent Olympic Games?
In the current domestic setter, the competition pattern with Diao Linyu is nothing more than Ding Xia and Yao Di. Compared with the above two, Diao Linyu is inexperienced. Because in the Rio Olympic cycle, the setter of the national team is the rotation of Ding Xia and Yao Di, but Diao Linyu is in the marginal role of the national team, so what she lacks is the tempering of the competition.
Yao Di's advantage is that she has strong self-confidence and is more proficient in running in with the national team, but she is slow to pass the ball, lacks the overall situation on the field, and is also weak in blocking the net. If the opponent's serve hits our pass, Yao Di's pass will be greatly reduced. At present, all the strong teams of the world women's volleyball team have put forward high requirements for the speed of foot movement, and for a setter, it is difficult to adapt to the modern volleyball trend without speed.
Ding Xia played a substitute for Diao Linyu in the national team last year, and her performance was not bad, but in the face of the upcoming Olympic Games, Ding Xia is 32 years old, and in terms of physical strength, she is a little powerless, and Ding Xia's injuries accumulated over the years have also limited her level of performance. Therefore, among the domestic setters, only Diao Linyu has the conditions to impact the Olympic Games in terms of ability and age.
In fact, Diao Linyu's own skills are good, and the reason why her performance is unstable is that she has both psychological and technical problems, but the root cause is that Cai Bin's speed of light system has too high requirements for her, and it is far beyond her technical limitations. In the era of Zhang Changning and Hui Ruoqi, the Jiangsu women's volleyball team was more inclined to play high because of its outstanding side attack ability, but it did not require the speed of the setter. But after Hui Ruoqi retired, when Cai Bin was in charge of the Jiangsu team, Diao Linyu was basically able to adapt to the requirements of speed. But when he arrived at the national team, in the face of the defense and blocking of tall players in Europe and the United States, Cai Bin could only find a breakthrough in terms of speed, and the requirements for Diao Linyu were several notches higher, which made Diao Linyu's performance unstable. But in last year's World League match with the United States team, it was Diao Linyu's stable performance that he defeated this powerful opponent in a reversal.
Fans, what do you think of the choice of setters for the Chinese women's volleyball team? We'd love to hear your insights.