Cup Update - Semi's vs Paok

Last night we played the Semi finals of cup vs Jonathan Winder's team Paok.  They gym is only 5 minutes from ours but much bigger.  They don't have heat in the gym and needles to say it was COLD.  The morning training was really bad.  Everyone had on their sweats, gloves, and even beanies (winter caps).  But everyone was in good spirits.  They have a really high ceiling so guys were all trying to see if they/we could kick the ball to the top...apparently its never been done.  It was fun to try non the less as well as serving a few skyballs!

The gym wasn't much warmer pre game.  Guys again wore gloves and full sweats...But the real story of the night was the Paok fans.  I've NEVER been a part of something so wild.  I've seen fans curse and scream at players.  I've seen fans throw water bottles, coins and paper at players but I've never seen fans throw explosives at players.  Right before we were about to start the set the fans continuously threw paper rolls and cut up paper squares on the court.  This delayed the start an extra 20 minutes.  As we were waiting for them to clean it up and trying to stay warm I noticed a item thrown 3 feet from some of our players.  It looked like a grenade with smoke coming out of the top.  At first I just thought it was a smoke bomb and noticed my friend Stelios walking towards it to kick it away off the court.  He was probably 2 feet from it when it exploded.  Some of the plastic shrapnel hit him in the shin as well as my other friend/teammate Zenia.  They cleared us out of the gym at this point.

When we came back in to the gym the fans were still singing and being loud but no more stuff was being thrown and we eventually got the game started.  We got off to a slow start but never fell too far behind.  Ended up pulling out a very tight set with some key service and a couple good blocks.  The first set was very important for us as it was the key to our victory.

In the second set it was close until about 12-11.  Then our setter went back to the service line and took us all the way to 18 or 19-12.  At this point a fan threw an entire cup of soda at him which paused the match for another 10 minutes.  We finished out the set with no problems and took a 2-0 lead.

The third set was back and forth until 14-15 when we called a timeout and some coffee was thrown at us again.  The court was splashed with sticky iced coffee.  Took them a while to clean this up as well but we came out of the time out and took a 16-15 lead.  The point differential was marginal until we broke loose at 24-21 and eventually took the set 25-22.  As soon as the last point was over full water bottles, big batteries, paper balls and full soda cans started flying at our team.  Then I noticed a big flare that looked like a stick of dynamite not five feet from me and a lot of my teammates.  I took off towards the other team but only got 2 steps away when my eardrums numbed.  No one was injured but it was just plain stupid.  We didn't shake hands with the other team because we all scattered into the halls of the locker rooms.

Of course we were happy to win the match 3-0 and were able to leave the gym with smiles on our faces. But at the same time this is not a sporting event that I would wish on anybody.  One of the players on our team was hit in the foot by a full can of soda and I'm pretty sure his big toe is black and blue.  Its not the worse injury but there could have been some serious injuries.  Not cool!  

I know Jaime Rose (Jonathan's wife) took lots of pics and video and will be putting it up on her blog.  I'll grab some from there or post the link to her blog when she has it up.

Next game on Sunday!