Volleyball: Invincible KK Boys defeated Sarwan to become champion. goa news
Panaji: All the games in the group stage were competitive till the semi-finals of the All Goa Volleyball Tournament with three away players, which ended in four sets.KK Boys showed their true colors in the knockout stage. Led by talismanic Ashwal Rai, the Santa Cruz team overcame the challenge of favorites Detelz Doctor in straight sets earlier and performed even better in the final, defeating Sarwan Bicholim 25-19, 27-25, 25-22 at the Modi Ground in Merced late on Saturday night.The tournament attracted huge crowds as fans waited till the early hours of the morning to watch the Indian stars in action.Undoubtedly, the horse was the biggest attraction. He could travel to Goa only after his name was not considered for the national team camp in Gandhinagar. The reason? It is not form; The star spiker missed the national championship as he wanted international exposure for himself and starred in the Mongolian Premier League. The selectors, quite strangely, left him out along with Jerome Vinith, who had also played in Mongolia and won the league with Tuv Mig VC.While his Indian teammates were training in Gujarat for the AVC Cup, everything was business as usual for Ashwal in Merseyside. In the final, he took time to settle into his rhythm and won only six points in the first set. But when KK Boys won the match, they had 10 winners in the second set and 14 winners in the third set.He couldn’t win it alone. Vishakh was also there. The spiker came up with important points, especially in the second set when KK Boys overcame a seven-point deficit, largely thanks to her powerful serve.Tamil Nadu setter Nanjil Surya, representing Indian Universities, was intriguing as ever, while the local boys – Nitin Sawant, Hemant Naik and the popular Ashwek Gawde played their roles to perfection.After losing the first set, Sarwan took a huge lead of seven points at 14-7 in the second set, but somehow lost. Once the set slipped away from them, there was no way to bounce back, even for a team that had Prime Volleyball League (PVL) stars Shubham Choudhary and Sahil Kanwal.The All Goa Volleyball Tournament was organized by the Almeida Brothers and Pogo Boys Merces in the memory of Vicente Almeida and Bonifacio Almeida.Individual Awards: Best Setter: Rahul Chokla (Sarvan), Best Smasher of the Final: Ashwek Gawde (KK Boys), Best defender: Yatish Moraskar (KK Boys), man of the Match: Nanjil Surya (KK Boys), Best Player of the Tournament: Ashwal Rai (KK Boys), Crowd Favorite: Nitin Sawant (KK Boys).