Czech Volleyball Team Crashes Out of European Championship After Controversial Referee Decision

The Czech national volleyball team lost to Belgium at the European Championship in Turin, missing a chance to take a set point in the second set after a controversial call by the referees. Players say that episode broke them psychologically, and the team barely put up a fight in the sets that followed.

"It's completely unclear why the referee blew the whistle on that ball — he shouldn't have. We could have played the rally out. Maybe we wouldn't have won it anyway, but that's not the point. Then we had a match point on our serve and failed to convert it. I think that's what broke us a little," lamented Czech setter Luboš Bartůněk.

According to him, it was precisely after that disputed moment and the ensuing argument with the referees that the team lost its focus. From the third set onward, the Czechs, to put it in football terms, were playing "one-way traffic" — the Belgians stepped up in almost every aspect of the game, while their opponents' output collapsed. "We stopped setting properly, stopped defending, stopped executing our game plan," Bartůněk admitted.

Slumps Plagued the Team Throughout the Tournament

Players acknowledge that these swings in form followed the Czech team throughout the entire championship. "We'd always play a great set, and then suddenly the next one would be a total collapse. I can't explain it myself," said the experienced setter, at a loss for an answer.

The team's new captain, Patrik Indra, was equally unable to explain it — and his own scoring stats mirrored the team's condition perfectly: he scored nine points in the first set, which the Czechs won, but only five points in the rest of the match combined. Bringing on Šotola as a substitute didn't help either, as he added just a single point.

"We can't afford to win a set at the finish and then immediately lose the next one by three points. This has dogged us the whole tournament — we kept having these lapses. I suppose it was bound to end this way," said Indra regretfully. He played through the entire tournament despite back pain.

He added that Belgium, for their part, played superb volleyball that the Czechs simply had no answer for. "Virtually error-free, especially in attack. Their all-rounder, whom we'd contained fairly well in the first two sets, really came alive. All we can do now is congratulate them," the Czech captain concluded.

Read also: Free Czech language courses for foreigners: where to learn

Around Prague, based on reporting by sport.cz