NVL Review (21st and 22nd March) - Onyx come up trumps to seal Division 2 East title

The penultimate weekend of NVL action saw limited matches because of Cup and Shield matches – but there were still some notable moments.

  Women’s NVL 

Onyx have clinched the Division 2 East title with a game to spare after a resounding victory over Sussex Dolphins on Sunday. 

The London club needed just one more victory from their final tweo matches to pip season-long rivals Cambridge to the post. 

And they did just that with a resounding straight sets win that was their 11th success in 13 league outings (25-16, 25-17, 25-11). 

Elsewhere, Herts moved level on points with Dartford Chargers in mid-table after winning a five-set thriller at Dartford Technology College. 

The visitors trailed 2-1 in sets but managed to turn things around, edging a nail-biting final set by just two points (16-25, 25-20, 19-25, 25-17, 15-13). 

Black Country kept alive their play-off hopes in Division 2 West, relegating opponents Coventry and Warwick Riga in the process. 

Their 27-25, 25-21, 25-15 success means they can still sneak into second – but only if they win their final game and Oxford Eagles come unstuck in theirs. 

Manchester Liberators are in a similar position after their edged to a five-set success at home to Newcastle Staffs. 

They were two sets to the good, but ended up dropping a point as they had to go the distance to close things out (25-16, 25-19, 22-25, 20-25, 15-13). 

Now they must win their final game in straight sets and hope The Miners Doncaster are defeated by the same margin to effect the change up in set quotient needed to go above the Yorkshire club. 

Richmond and Dartford Warriors might be a little sick of the sight of each other for the foreseable future after playing each other across 10 sets over one day. 

In playing catch-up on games, the two teams agreed to play each other twice at the same venue on Saturday – and both sides ended up winning one five setter each, underlying just how closely matched the two teams were. 

On Sunday, Richmond showed they had suffered no ill-effects from the previous day as they secured a 3-0 victory over Essex Ravens. 

Men’s NVL 

MK City will finish second in the Division 2 Central table, but their regular season ended in disapointment as they suffered defeat at Loughborough Students. 

The hosts might have been in the play-off mix themselves had they not experienced a mid-season loss of form, either side of which they have won matches regularly. 

On this occasion, the students led 1-0 and 2-1 before finally getting the job done in the fifth (25-20, 21-25, 25-21, 20-25, 15-13). 

Each side came out on top in one match and lost the other in the triangular between Wombourne, Chelmsford and Tamworth Spartans. 

Wombourne clinched a 3-1 triumph over Chelmsford, who beat Tamworth in straight sets, before Spartans defeated Wombourne by a 3-1 margin.