Resurgent Kochi knocks Chennai out of PVL

Hyderabad: A resurgent Kochi Blue Spikers keeps their semi hopes alive in the Prime Volley League as they beat Chennai Blitz in a five set thriller here at the GMC Balayogi Indoor Stadium on Wednesday. (15-12, 15-11, 14-15, 12-15, 15-10).

Determined to win to keep their hopes alive, the Blue Spikers started off in a cautious way, but soon dominated the proceedings thanks to brilliant coordination in blocking and winning spikes. Cody Coldwell was the star of the match for his scintillating performance, while Erin supported him with clinical spikes at regular intervals.

Captain Karthik showed his class once again while Deepesh Sinha regained his lost form which made a lot of difference in the match. He was injured in the last game but luckily got more than enough time to recover as Kochi played today after a gap of a week.

However, rustiness was never on show on the court and Kochi pocketed the first two sets in style as they hardly make any mistakes in the process. Chennai came back strongly in the next two sets and another Bengaluru like defeat threatened on Kochi.

But a cautious approach in the final set saw them leading by 3-1 in quick time and never allowed their lead margin to drop even once in the set. Cody finds his spikes at will from all the angles and even finds his drops winning points.

Erin completed the match in style with four consecutive smashes from almost the same position to give Kochi the first points of the competition.

For Chennai, they need to regroup to record a win at least from their remaining two matches. Though their chance to earn a semi-final berth is gone with today's defeat, they can still prevent a couple of teams from progressing in to the semis.

For the Blitz, Fernando Rosario and Akhin displayed theire class, while Naveen Raja couldn't perform any way near his calibre to lift his team. The Blue Spikers will play in a Kerala Derby on Friday against a spirited Calicut Heroes, which could be crucial for both the teams.