PDT Volleyball team not victorious, but virtuous in defeat.

As beaten finalists in last year’s Vail Williams Charity Volleyball Tournament, this year PDT were hoping to go one better and go on to lift the trophy. All the talk pre-tournament was whether last year’s winners Forza Doors could be slammed off top spot and we sought to do just that. The format for the tournament involved two groups of four, with the final group standings deciding your opponent from the opposing group in the first knockout round.

Pitted against Vail Williams A team, HNW Architects and Regus in our group, we looked to gain some early momentum on our route to victory.

It was clear from our intense warm up that the windy conditions were not well suited to our more technical style, and whilst struggling to battle the elements we came up short in our first game against a very good Vale Williams team with a narrow defeat.

After two games rest to reassess our tactics and don our complimentary sweat bands (as if they might somehow help improve our skills), PDT stormed to victory in our second game against Regus. However, back to back games clearly took their toll, and as the wind picked up we were unfortunately unable to repeat our success in our final group game against a physical HNW Architects team.

After finishing what was a very respectable third place in our group in blustery conditions, our first knock out would be a repeat of last year’s final against Forza Doors, who had indeed proved fallible and had only managed second place in their group.

Between stages, some of PDT’s number turned to Dutch courage to try raise their game for the upcoming clash but, as the weather made it increasingly unplayable, Forza Doors successfully shut us out for a second year in a row and that was to be the end to PDT’s challenge for the trophy for another year.

It wasn’t quite the success PDT had been hoping for nevertheless we all seemed to enjoy playing a sport none of us clearly had much experience in. We would like to congratulate eventual winners RH Partnership Architects who, without meaning to sound bitter, may have had a slight advantage having designed the venue! We would also like to thank our hosts Vail Williams for a brilliantly organised event and for putting on a great spread. We hope to be asked back again next year for another “dig” at winning the trophy!

The event made for a fantastic evening, and raised a lot of money for charities Naomi House and Challengers.