ハイキュー・Haikyuu! 🏐 Vol. 3

That’s so cool!! I want to go to a nerd panel. :laughing:
Also since you’re talking about Tsukishima, I was actually on the phone with a friend from Japan this morning and I asked her if she had watched Haikyuu → she did and didn’t remember much but she said she really liked Tsukki!! another one :v:

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I got it from Amazon, though the one’s that shipped to here were thrice as expensive as the last time. For CDJapan at least the first volumes are sold out but they can sometimes order via third party there. When you click on the article there should be a green box labeled “See Available Proxy Listings”. Just checked and apparently not for vol. 3 though. :frowning: (vol. 4 is in stock, vol. 5 by proxy)
Or go for the complete set (https://www.cdjapan.co.jp/product/NEOBK-2594920?s_ssid=e4491a6093a44550dc) and re-sell vol.1+2. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

EDIT: Found vol. 3 on amazon: https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/古舘-春一/dp/4088705211/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1620289306&sr=1-1 digital and physical apparently as well, though definitely more expensive than usual.
Found another physical copy here: https://honto.jp/netstore/pd-book_25312251.html the site’s only in japanese but you can shop internationally and that part seems to be available in english (though I haven’t really figured out, how that works).
And here are a few links for shop options when you scroll down a bit: ハイキュー!! 3/古舘 春一 | 集英社 ― SHUEISHA ― (already checked Rakuten and they’re sold out as well)

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Thank you!! I looked through all the links you posted and managed to get volumes 3 - 5, so at least I’m set for the next few months!

Oh shoot we got to volume 3 in the times I’ve been absent.

Hoping to be back for the chapter 17 read aloud, though I am sad to miss the watch party this weekend. :sob:

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Thx for the explanation, I might just transition from lurking to joining this time, too! After taking half a year off from Wanikani (including the forums) I am really thrilled that there is a Haikyuu book club now. Haikyuu’s the b.e.s.t.:blush:

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Yay welcome! Excited to have you join~!

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Is the starting date 7th of May still valid? It looks so quiet here, and the vocabulary table seems to be the one for volume one…do we start before or after the read aloud?

The starting date is still valid! You should be reading chapter 17 from volume 3 right now, and we’ll do the read aloud this upcoming Saturday. The vocab list should have vocab up to chapter 16 at least, and chapter 17 will get added as people do the reading this week.

Of course, if you have questions while you’re reading, or comments on anything, please ask!

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Try scrolling the tabs at the bottom all the way to the right to see the latest chapters :slight_smile:

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@caraage character sheet up and I know you were excited about a character that was appearing this chapter, but I don’t remember if you said who it was. I was excited to read for Nishnoya, but if that’s who you were looking forward to reading, we can work something out.

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It’s first come first serve babie! He isn’t leaving anytime soon, so go ahead and take him this week!

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At our viewing marathon we talked a bit about different sports. That got me a bit thinking about: How realistic is Haikyuu?

TL;DR ('cause it got a bit lengthy): imho it’s pretty good.

Summary

I’m comparing it to my personal experience of 20 years playing semi-professional for my home team starting from when I was 10. I can’t remember for when juniors but for seniors (which is everything above 18 years old) I played in every league from lowest to about mid-level from 10 levels in total.

Talents & Abilities:
I’ll keep to Karasuno’s players to avoid spoilers.
My first reaction actually was “no way are they that good already at their age” especially in the first episode. ^^ But I actually revised my opinion about that. For that I probably got to explain a bit about the system for juniors here in Germany. We got a system subdivided into under-13, under-16 and under-18 where you’re playing with less players on a smaller court: 3vs3 (6x6m), 4vs4 (7x7m) and only starting with 6vs6 (9x9m) for the latest group to make it easier for younger/smaller children. For the first two groups you also don’t have specific player roles assigned and everyone is taking on every role when rotating. I don’t think we even had a libero until I started playing in seniors.
As far as I could see in the anime they start playing fairly early on with 6vs6 and already assigning the special roles on court which gives more time for individual training in that regard and sharpening the respective skills (definitely relevant for setter and libero).

In my team we had training twice a week for 2h and in the senior-group about 16 games per season from around September to March/April. Tournaments were mostly in prepartion for gaming-season and you’d get to play 2-3 teams in a group and the best of those get to advance for the next group.
In the anime they’re training 5 times a week and they’re probably way more disciplined about it than we were at that age. ^^’ During my youth we did play against a team that was coming from a sports driven school with 5 time/week training and they were always levels better than us in agility and technique. The tournament system where you’re out if you loose once puts extra pressure on improvement.
Factoring that in doesn’t make their skill-level that impossible anymore.

Generally speaking about all of Karasuno’s players are absolutely believable in their abilities on court, including Nishinoya even though he’s called a “genius” (I’d attribute his skills to early specialisation). With Hinata and Kageyama being a bit of an exception (that MC power). Smaller people definitely tend to jump higher to compensate (and they got less bodily weight to carry) though his speed seems to be a bit outragerous running from one side to the other at the net (at least for the fast tosses; regarding that you also can’t cut short the time it takes to land from a jump so that would definitely take away from his speed). I can’t really talk about Kageyama from experience as I’m not a setter but so far I haven’t met anyone with that level of precision (though I had the pleasure of playing with some really good setters, which would be Suga’s level); maybe on a truly professional level.
Properly receiving definitely takes time to lear, Hinata and Tsukishima being still quite bad at it makes absolute sense. I think I got to about Daichi’s level after 13-15 years and it took more to be actually confident about it (though I’m not a confident person in general). And I definitely met some players with as much attack-power as Tanaka.
The serve-training with the bottles as you see it in the intermissions is a bit unrealistic as in being that precise is just kinda next level. But the way Oikawa focuses on a specific player or a corner of the court is something you absolutely do and train for. Also the power-level if you specifically train for it (had two players on our team who did). Though you’ll definitely loose precision when focusing more on power and vice versa.

Scores:
dmner actually already asked about that on the discord channel: it’s not that uncommon to go slightly above, like 26 oder 27, especially with teams that are evenly matched, as you have to lead by 2 points to win the set. Above that is not that often and I think I can only remember one or maybe two games where a set ended at about 30 maybe one that got to 35. That’s when both teams are really fighting to win. ^^ Though usually it ends with 25:2X when teams are at comparable levels. It’s also absolutely possible to turn a set around from 24:18 when you got a good server. Matches like Hinata’s first one where you loose with just about 10 points do also happen then there’s great difference in skill in a league (skill levels usually get closer the higher you move up in leagues). A set usually takes about 20 minutes, so 31 minutes whith 2 sets and that few points for the loosing team is definitely realistic.

Injuries:
What you’ll always get are bruises and mine got significantly less since I stopped playing. I guess they got omitted 'cause they’re just too common. Most other common injuries are sprained fingers (had those twice) usually from blocking and stretching or tearing of ligaments especially in the ankle (had those thrice); if you’re unlucky a rupture of cruciate ligament (knew 2 players with that). I haven’t seen anything resembling how Tsukshima’s finger tore from Ushijima’s spike but depending on the angle of his finger and the power of the spike it might be possible. I also definitely did the taping of two fingers together to continue playing. I haven’t see anyone loose a tooth (especially a molar; chipping of a front tooth after a bad dive should be possible) but a nosebleed from getting hit in the face definitely happend. A teammate even got a slight concussion once.

Attacks:
All those varieties in attacks definitely happen. There are a lot of combinations you can play with your attackers to gain an advantage on the block. The variation where Nishinoya is setting and the setter being one of the attackers is not used that often due to specific limitations to the libero when setting; you’d usually use the MB for that. But it does happen when the setter can’t either get to the ball in time or has to defend. I haven’t seen a “shot” for the wingspiker yet which is about half the length of the usual distance from the setter to the spiker and it’s relatively flat over the net (it would probably equal the 0-tempo for the MB). Also not that many straight attacks along the outer line though that might be due to the blocks. (see pictures)

That attack Hinata does at warm-up against Seijo (S2) or Shiratori (S3) (can’t remember which) where he’s hitting the ball right behind the net is absolutely possible and I saw it personally in a men’s game when doing the referee. Happend so fast I couldn’t comprehend whether the ball was in or out.

What you definitely don’t do is Hinata’s sprint to the attack. ^^ Usually you do two running-steps and one stemming-step to direct the forward-movement into an up-movement. When I played MB I’d usually only do one running step with a slight spring before to get me going; I’m just too slow to move back from the net and then forward again to do more. I guess they wanted to show Hinata’s speed and how he’s using that for his jumping- and attack-power.

The thing Tsukishima does against Seijo where he’s fooling the defense by switching between loops and spike is something you start doing when you can’t get through with your attacks either the block is set to well (in that case you loop over and short behind the block) or because the recieve got no problem with how hard your attacks are and react fast enough for the direction. So switching it up to play a short loop or a longer attack means the receive can’t prepare in advance for either 'cause they don’t know whether to stand a bit closer to the net or father away.

Blocks:
The different ways to block, active (where it get’s “send back” to the spiker) & passive (where it end on your court with a “one touch”), are true. Also the depiction about spreading the fingers like that and making some kind of “roof” over the net is good. In one picture I was a bit worried for Tsukishima’s thumbs though: when you put them too far to the front and less to the side, that’s where injuries happen.

What Kuroo does to Bokuto in the trainig camp where he moves his hand after setting the block wouldn’t be something you usually do though. In general the block does cover for either a cross-attack or a straight-attack along the line with the defense covering for the other eventuality. Mostly the block would cover the straight esp. for the WS on the left, so the setter wouldn’t get in to the situation to defend, and because the defense got a little more them to prepare with the cross.

Serves:
Both the jump- and float-serve (which really is the meanest for receivers) are things you train for on a higher level. The jump-serve got the advantage of being a bit faster than a “normal” serve as you hit the ball more from above and it got a bit of a downward path instead of going “up” first to go over the net. I never manged that as I’m pretty bad at throwing the ball up for myself, but at mid-to-high levels it becomes pretty standard.

The float-serve is one where you try to give the ball no rotation and due to the air resistance (I think) the course of the ball get’s slightly “unstable”. It looks like it goes in a straight line at first but towards the end it describes more of a curve (either right or left which you can’t predict) which leads to the ball gliding over your arms from the side even though you stood perfectly facing the ball at first. I did train a bit for that and it’s hard to get consistent results.
I haven’t see something like the jump-float-serve as the individual sets are already hard to master though maybe they do that at professional levels.

Receives:
Actually not much to say here. All pretty good from the mistakes you can make to getting used to the serve or attack of a specific spiker (like Nishinoya does with Ushijima). And yes, somtimes the attack happens so fast, that you just got not time to react. What Nishinoya did at the end of last chapter to Kageyama’s serve is how every receive optimally should be: not just the course to the setter’s position but also taking the spin, speed and power out of the ball the make it easier for the setter.
The training game against Seijo: when Oikawa is targeting Tsukishima and he moves back a bit with Daichi taking over is something you often do when one of your receives got trouble with a serve. You move the players around a bit so the one who has trouble isn’t a direct target anymore and at best is replaced with somone who’s good at receives. Sometimes that means you’re receiving with less players than you usually would (e.g. normally receiving with 4 and then only with 3) or you move that player to one of the corners with the rest of the receivers following suit in that direction and one from the front row moves backward.

What Ennoshita is suggesting about him standing a bit farther to the back to catch the “one touch” from the block is also a valid strategy.

Ace:
I hadn’t heard of that term or position before though it does sound pretty cool. ^^ But we did have a few players who we could kind of bank a sure point on. And it can absolutely be both a wingspiker or middleblocker, so go for it, Hinata. :wink: It being a wingspiker is probably saver though as every sh** receive gets tossed to the wingspiker. ^^’

Inner thoughts and communication:
I’ll book the lengthy ones as freedom in literature ^^ 'cause usually you don’t have that much time to discuss things on the field or think about your past, current situation and future goals.
I actually find it hindering to think to much about what and how I’m going to do something and my best moves probably happend when I was just reacting and not thinking about it, definitely the fastest reactions when defending. I did play a bit of the setter though when playing for fun at uni and you do think about which attacker is where, where the block (probably) is and what you can do with the receive you get (like “is it good enough for a quick”, “am I far enough in the middle for a back toss”, “should I play it save and toss to the WS”).
Longer comments on good serves, receives and attacks are usually from people on the bench. On the field you keep it to short things like “yes”, “here” or numbers for the kind of attack/combination you want the setter to set for you.

I’m not sure whether the finger signs the setter does for the different attacks/combinations are correct, ‘cause I never properly learned them. ^^’ But they can totally vary for different teams and are absolutely something you do. The setter shows them to his team before the serve and they are usually valid for the first attack though I think they can also be taken in general for that point.

EDIT:
Setter:
So far every toss Kageyama and Sugawara did (except the super precise one where Hinata closed his eyes) are standard tosses which every setter at mid-level should know how to do. As an attacker you sometimes do have a preference for a setter you can work better with but a good setter should be able to adjust his tosses to all his spikers.

The “view beyond the wall”:
As fantastic as it sounds it’s absolutely true and I got to experience it myself a rare few times like that. When the toss is really perfect and your jump feels like it goes on forever like you’re standing in the air, time somhow seems to slow down and you can see the other side quite clearly like that. That really feels like flying. Whether you can hit your intended target is another matter.

Did some more edits on attacks and receives.

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This is really cool and interesting! Thanks for writing it up. I know nothing about volleyball so interesting to hear that Haikyuu isn’t toooo far off in terms of accuracy!

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Added two short paragraphs at the end about the setter and the “view beyond the wall”.

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Thanks for writing this up! It was very interesting to read through.

It’s interesting that you noted that Suga’s level is where “really good setters” that you’ve played with are. I think the anime has a tendency to make you feel like Suga’s only contribution is that he can cheer the team up and mix things up, both on and off the court, and it’s hard to get a realistic read on how good of a player Suga is since Kageyama, Oikawa, Atsumu, and basically every other setter seems to be constantly overshadowing him.

Loved the comment about Kuroo moving his hand to block Bokuto. I’ve been wondering how he (and Aone from Dateko) does that since it seems like the game would be moving too fast at that point.

The comments about the jump, float, and jump-float serves are very appreciated. Really brings into perspective how hard Yams has to work to get it even moderately functional, and why his serve “fails” so frequently. It’s especially disappointing to see Kinoshita excel at it after watching Yams work hard for four seasons at that point.

As a side note, love how unrealistic it is that Hinata has been conked on the head more than 5 times at this point and has suffered no serious injuries.

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What Suga definitely has in advantage to Kageyama or what Kageyama still has to learn, that he’s probably paying more attention to how each of his spikers need their toss to best attack. There’s that one scene where he’s commenting that for Asahi the ball needs to be high and a bit away from the net. Stuff like that comes with experience and having a good connection with your spikers. Suga might not be flashy but he’s really good in his consistency. Also the tranquility he brings to the game is something that is important for a setter and which Kageyama still lacks. Yes, it’s good if you can play fast attacks but it’s equally important to get some calm back into the game e.g. after a difficult receive to give your players some time to get to their positions again.

Which gives me the idea I could add a paragraph on player changes and timeouts. ^^

About the block: You could probably do it 'cause with spikers who have a good technique you usually see in which direction they’re aiming (for a cross you run a bit more in a curve and for a straight a bit more straight towards the net); it’s the amateurs with a wonky technique you got to watch out for. A good spiker can still adjust the direction with his hand though which is what the guy from Wakunan is doing (was it Wataru?). When you’re moving just one hand you’re leaving a gap between that hand and your other one though which can be exploited.

Heads are actually pretty hard; I’ve been hit sometimes on the head and your nose definitely hurts and your eyes get all watery but usually you’d still be able to play. I still wouldn’t want to get hit by Bokuto or Ushijima though.

EDIT: A bit more on the difference between Suga and Kageyama: There’s that one scene where Tsukishima is telling Kageyama to just set the ball regularly 'cause he got his own little tricks and I get why he was so annoyed. ^^ Kageyama is basically already deciding what the best attack would be (based on the block and defense). As a spiker you react to that toss and play the ball accordingly. Suga on the other hand gives a toss that’s a bit more general. Not as in “the general direction of the spiker” but it leaves a bit more variety as how the spiker can hit the ball and what he does with that. It’s not that either style is good or bad per se. Both can work and it probably depends on the spiker. Hinata’s still inexperienced so he can benefit from Kageyama’s direction. The other players got a little more experience or in Tsukishima’s are smart enough to do somthing on their own with a more general setting.
In season 2 Hinata is starting to think on his own and that’s when Kageyama has to change his setting style closer to Suga’s as in tossing the ball where the spiker can best hit it and decide a bit more on his own.

Also added some stuff for attacks and receives in the original post.

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Have signed up for the precious flower that is Sugawara :sunflower::blossom::rosette: looking forward to the readalong!

Also, just read through the chapter and I love Hinata and Nishinoyas interactions so much. Those adorable fools…

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Glad to have you back in the read along @sycamore!

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So cool to read about the level of realism from a player’s perspective! Thanks for writing that all up.

My friend introduced me to a volleyball coach and player who reacts to Haikyuu videos on YouTube (linked to season 1 episode 1, but he’s up to mid-season 2 at this point). I appreciate his calm demeanor, insights not only on volleyball but also animation (apparently he went to animation school too?), and intercut video clips of him doing the moves he notes in his reaction.

Now why did I come here again? Oh right, I wanted to share something I thought was cool while transcribing the chapter.

Ukai fun fact

I had trouble finding the right う and かい for Coach 鳥養. Once I found them I was curious about the kanji meanings. And of course Furudate-sensei named his coach “bird nurturer” :grin:

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I love watching Coach Donny’s reactions! He provides a great perspective as both a coach and an animator, and his reactions are very genuine. I frequently watch his videos to relax.

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